Author: Robert J. Marks | Page 9

Abstract digital human face. Artificial intelligence concept of big data or cyber security. 3D illustration

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post

Robert J. Marks
Date
July 10, 2022

Categorized
Artificial Intelligence, Religion

Tagged
Anthony Levandowski, Featured, Non-Computable You (book), Ray Kurzweil, Robert J. Marks, Singularity Is Near (book), Waymo}

Artificial Intelligence, Worshipped as God, Is No Ordinary Deity!

_{Not only will we be reborn into new, immortal silicon bodies but rules regarding theft don’t seem to apply anymore…} _{Robert J. Marks
July 10, 2022

5

Artificial Intelligence, Religion}

This article was published in The Stream (July 6, 2022) under the title “The Church of Artificial Intelligence of the Future” and is republished with permission. There is a church that worships artificial intelligence (AI). Zealots believe that an extraordinary AI future is inevitable. The technology is not here yet, but we are assured that it’s coming. We will have the ability to be uploaded onto a computer and thereby achieve immortality. You will be reborn into a new, immortal silicon body. Of course, through salvation in Jesus Christ, Christianity has offered a path to immortality for over two thousand years. Someday, we are told, software will write better and better AI software to ultimately achieve a superintelligence. The superintelligence Read More ›

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post

Robert J. Marks
Date
July 8, 2022

Categorized
Mathematics

Tagged
Featured}

Some Infinities Are Bigger Than Others But There’s No Biggest One

_{Georg Cantor came up with an ingenious proof that infinities can differ in size even though both remain infinite} _{Robert J. Marks
July 8, 2022

7

Mathematics}

When a child is asked “what is bigger than infinity,” the response is often “Infinity plus one.” No. Infinity plus one is still infinity. But we can show that the number of points on the interval zero to one is a bigger infinity than the counting numbers are. The first clue is the fact that we can’t count the number of points on a line interval. Try labeling the points on a line as points 1, 2, 3, etc. No matter what scheme you come up with, there will always be some points on the line segment that are not included in your count. Georg Cantor (1845–1918) came up with an ingenious argument to show that the infinite number of Read More ›

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post

Robert J. Marks
Date
July 5, 2022

Categorized
Mathematics

Tagged
Featured, Irrational numbers, Irrational numbers and infinity}

4. How Almost Any Number Can Encode the Library of Congress

_{That’s a weird, counterintuitive — but quite real — consequence of the concept of infinity in math} _{Robert J. Marks
July 5, 2022

7

Mathematics}

We are used to dealing with simple numbers, like ½ and 2. Most numbers are not that simple. Most numbers, like 0.847859028378490… go on forever and ever without repeating or showing any pattern. Note that such numbers, called irrational numbers, have an infinite number of digits. And there are a lot of them. The number 0.847859028378490… for example differs from the number 0.847859023378490… (See if you can spot the difference.) If two numbers differ only at the billionth decimal and are otherwise the same, they are different numbers. Because an irrational number is infinitely long — and we have seen in the first three posts that weird things happen with infinity — we’d expect something weird to happen with irrational Read More ›

The emergence of a problem and the search for solutions. Many options for solving a complex problem

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post

Robert J. Marks
Date
July 5, 2022

Categorized
Artificial Intelligence

Tagged
Ben Thompson, Featured, Lee Sedol, Non-Computable You (book), Robert J. Marks, Selmer Bringsjord, Swarm intelligence (bullies vs. dweebs)}

Machines with Minds? The Lovelace Test vs. the Turing Test

_{The answers computer programs give sometimes surprise me too — but they always result from their programming} _{Robert J. Marks
July 5, 2022

9

Artificial Intelligence}

Non-Computable You: What You Do That Artificial Intelligence Never Will (Discovery Institute Press, 2022) by Robert J. Marks is available here. What follows is an excerpt from Chapter 2. Selmer Bringsjord, and his colleagues have proposed the Lovelace test as a substitute for the flawed Turing test. The test is named after Ada Lovelace. Bringsjord defined software creativity as passing the Lovelace test if the program does something that cannot be explained by the programmer or an expert in computer code.2 Computer programs can generate unexpected and surprising results.3 Results from computer programs are often unanticipated. But the question is, does the computer create a result that the programmer, looking back, cannot explain? When it comes to assessing creativity (and Read More ›

Abstract background architecture lines. modern architecture detail

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post

Robert J. Marks
Date
July 3, 2022

Categorized
Mathematics

Tagged
Cantor's theory of infinity, Featured, Irrational numbers and infinity}

3. In Infinity, Lines and Squares Have an Equal Number of Points

_{We can demonstrate this fact with a simple diagram} _{Robert J. Marks
July 3, 2022

5

Mathematics}

In previous posts, we have established that two sets are of the same size if there is a one-to-one correspondence between the elements of both sets. Applying this principle to Cantor’s theory of infinity leads us to the weird but valid conclusion that the number of points on a line segment is the same as the number of points in a square. To show that this is true, here is a picture of a unit length line segment and a unit square. Let’s choose a point on the line segment. Let’s say 0.6917381276543… . It’s shown with a big blue dot on the line segment on the left. If this point corresponds to an irrational number, it goes on forever Read More ›

Big Bang in Space, The Birth of the Universe 3d illustration

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post

Robert J. Marks
Date
July 2, 2022

Categorized
Mathematics

Tagged
Featured}

2. Infinity Illustrates That the Universe Has a Beginning

_{The logical consequences of a literally infinite past are absurd, as a simple illustration will show} _{Robert J. Marks
July 2, 2022

5

Mathematics}

The size of a set is how many elements it contains. The set of letters {A,B,C} and the set of girls {Shirley, Goodness, Mercy} both have a cardinality of three. In a previous post, we showed that the infinities of counting numbers and even numbers are the same. Many subsets of the counting numbers have the same infinite size as the counting numbers. For example, consider the counting numbers and the set of numbers divisible by 10. and The size of the two sets is the same if there is a one-to-one mapping from one set to another. Here, 1 maps to 10, 2 maps to 20, 3 to 30, etc. This continues forever. The two sets are the same Read More ›

Full body gold dragon in infinity shape pose with 3d rendering include alpha path.

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post

Robert J. Marks
Date
July 1, 2022

Categorized
Mathematics

Tagged
David Hilbert (on infinities), Featured, infinity, Infinity (as understood in math)}

1. Why Infinity Does Not Exist in Reality

_{A few examples will show the absurd results that come from assuming that infinity exists in the world around us as it does in math} _{Robert J. Marks
July 1, 2022

7

Mathematics}

Does infinity exist in reality? There are, surprisingly, scientists who think infinity is a possibility even though they are unable to point to any example of infinity in reality. The great mathematician David Hilbert claimed that “the infinite is nowhere to be found in reality.” Nevertheless, the mathematical theory of infinity developed by Georg Cantor is beautiful. Hilbert was in awe of Cantor’s beautiful theory and said “No one shall drive us from the paradise which Cantor has created for us.” An assumption of the infinite leads to weird counterintuitive results. In this and the following four articles, various ludicrous properties of the infinite are explored. We’ll see, for example, that the entire Library of Congress is encoded somewhere in almost every Read More ›

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post

Robert J. Marks
Date
June 27, 2022

Categorized
Artificial Intelligence, Psychology}

Google’s LaMDA Not As Smart As Some Think

_{Lacking in the media coverage of the suspension of the engineer is any definition of the key word, “sentience”} _{Robert J. Marks
June 27, 2022

3

Artificial Intelligence, Psychology}

Google suspended an engineer, Blake Lemoine, for claiming that a Google AI project named LaMDA has become “sentient”. Google asserted that Lemoine had breached company confidentiality. But, in addition, Google disagreed with Lemoine that artificial intelligence at Google had achieved sentience. Eric Holloway has exposed the workings behind the curtain that show that LaMDA (Language Model for Dialogue Applications) was trained using examples from humans to do exactly what it did. It’s behavior was planned. That’s what AI does: what it is programmed to do. Here’s another angle that peels off more of LaMDA’s glitter. Lacking in the media coverage of the suspension of the engineer is any definition of the key word, “sentience.” This is an example of the seductive semantics commonly used Read More ›

US drone attack on the convoy of the Iranian general Qassem Soleimani, 3d render. Baghdad airport, Iraq.

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post

Robert J. Marks
Date
June 14, 2022

Categorized
Artificial Intelligence, Creativity, Military

Tagged
Autonomous drones, Drones vs. pilots, Featured, Military drones, Top Gun: Maverick (film 2022)}

Top Gun Maverick: Thrilling but Outdated by Today’s AI

_{How realistic is the continued use of manned aircraft in light of today’s technology?} _{Robert J. Marks
June 14, 2022

4

Artificial Intelligence, Creativity, Military}

I just saw Top Gun: Maverick. Everyone I know agrees that the movie is masterfully done and is thrilling entertainment. My emotions were whiplashed throughout the movie and by the end I was exhausted. But how realistic is the continued use of manned aircraft in light of today’s technology? Considering what today’s military drones can do, the story premise of the new Top Gun is technically outdated. The mission could be better executed by today’s drones, without risk of human life. Instead of riding your horse to the restaurant during a lightning storm, drive your Tesla or — better yet — get Uber Eats to deliver. Use the latest technology. The latest technology in drones is impressive. Consider some of Read More ›

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post

Robert J. Marks
Date
April 25, 2022

Categorized
Science, Social Media

Tagged
Michael Crichton}

Michael Crichton would call Twitterheads “Scoundrels”

_{Why “Scientific Consensus” is an Oxymoron} _{Robert J. Marks
April 25, 2022

4

Science, Social Media}

Twitter has a new policy concerning tweets: “Misleading advertisements on #Twitter that contradict the scientific consensus on #climatechange are prohibited, in line with its inappropriate content policy.” The word pairing “scientific consensus” used in this policy is a destructive science-stifling oxymoron. Michael Crichton (1942–2008) would surely have said so. Crichton was the author of wonderful science fiction, including Jurassic Park. and The Andromeda Strain. In a lecture at Caltech, the late master story teller gave Twitter’s policy a gut punch: Historically, the claim of consensus has been the first refuge of scoundrels; it is a way to avoid debate by claiming that the matter is already settled. Whenever you hear the consensus of scientists agrees on something or other, reach Read More ›

Beautiful woman undecided which man to choose

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post

Robert J. Marks
Date
December 30, 2021

Categorized
Artificial Intelligence, Philosophy of Mind, Programming

Tagged
Featured, Winograd Schema (and common sense)}

New: AI Learns to Simulate Common Sense

_{It is a simulation because the AI can perform the task but does not “understand” what the concepts mean} _{Robert J. Marks
December 30, 2021

3

Artificial Intelligence, Philosophy of Mind, Programming}

Paul Allen, a co-founder of Microsoft, was concerned AI had no common sense. In early 2018, Allen said “AI still lacks what most 10-year-olds possess: ordinary common sense.” He continued, “If we want AI to approach human abilities and have the broadest possible impact in research, medicine and business, we need to fundamentally advance AI’s common sense abilities.” Billionaire Allen coughed up $125 million and founded the Allen Institute for Artificial Intelligence in Seattle. I believed that AI would never simulate common sense but always left the door open. Unlike understanding, creativity and sentience, common sense could possibly be computable. There was no indication that common sense was non-algorithmic. And now AI has simulated common sense. The classic test for Read More ›

Blue glowing 4 dimensional object in space abstract fractal background

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post

Robert J. Marks
Date
December 19, 2021

Categorized
Philosophy, Religion

Tagged
Featured, Flatland (short novel)}

Can Higher Dimensions Help Us Understand Biblical Miracles?

_{We assume there are only three spatial dimensions because those are the ones we sense. What if there are four?} _{Robert J. Marks
December 19, 2021

8

Philosophy, Religion}

String theory in physics postulates the existence of ten, eleven, or even twenty-six seven spatial dimensions. (Some call time a dimension, but that’s not what we’re talking about here.) What’s going on? You and I experience only three spatial dimensions. Physicists say these other dimensions are compactified in strings – like a two dimensional plane rolled up into what looks like a one dimensional appearing skinny straw. What if higher dimensions weren’t compactified? What if, say, there were a fourth spatial dimension? Access to a fourth dimension explains some of the miracles described in the Bible. A classic book about higher dimensions is Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions by Edwin Abbott, first published in 1886. In the novel, life was constrained to Read More ›

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post

Robert J. Marks
Date
November 18, 2021

Categorized
Law, Programming

Tagged
Featured}

Rittenhouse Trial: Are Attorneys and Judge Tech/Math-Challenged?

_{Does simple pinch and zoom change pixels? The devil, though, is in the details} _{Robert J. Marks
November 18, 2021

3

Law, Programming}

In one of the many exchanges between lawyers and Judge Schroeder in the Kyle Rittenhouse trial, the degree to which pinching and zooming change cell phone images was addressed. Rittenhouse lawyer Mark Richards claimed it does. The district attorney Thomas Binger claimed there is no change. Richards first claimed that an image prepared by the prosecutor changed pixels using AI and logarithms. If AI is defined as any “gee whiz” technology, he was right. But pinch and zoom was invented in 2007 by Steve Jobs and uses nothing that can be considered modern AI. All nerds should laugh at the claim that “logarithms” were used in the pinch and zoom. Attorney Mark Richards obviously meant “algorithms” To his credit, Richards confessed he knew Read More ›

multiverse and alternative universes concept

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post

Robert J. Marks
Date
October 28, 2021

Categorized
Mathematics, Science

Tagged
David Hilbert, David Hilbert (on infinities), Featured, Hilbert's Hotel, Infinity (as understood in math), Isaac Newton, Multiverse (refuted by math)}

Why Just Anything Can’t Happen via Infinite Universes

_{We can see why not, using simple mathematical reasoning in this universe} _{Robert J. Marks
October 28, 2021

6

Mathematics, Science}

Can anything happen if there are an infinite number of universes each with an infinite number of possibilities in each? Can you be bald in one universe and fully haired in another? Can you have two eyeballs in this universe and three in another? The answer is no. In a nutshell, the reason is that some infinities are bigger than other infinities. (And this is not a claim like infinity plus one is bigger than infinity. Infinity plus one is still infinity.) The number of points on a line segment from, say zero to one, is a bigger infinity than the number of counting numbers {1,2,3,…}. We can label the infinite number of universes in the multiverse as universe #1, Read More ›

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post

Robert J. Marks
Date
August 30, 2021

Categorized
Artificial Intelligence, Arts & Culture, Creativity

Tagged
Featured}

It’s AI Art — But Is That Really Art?

_{Much depends on the claque that agrees that it IS art} _{Robert J. Marks
August 30, 2021

4

Artificial Intelligence, Arts & Culture, Creativity}

There are reports that AI has created wonderful music and great paintings. But who judges whether a creation is or isn’t art? 19th century writer Margaret Wolfe Hungerford claimed that “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.”1 So any analysis of AI art or music will be subjective. One person’s modern art masterpiece can be viewed by others as like a child’s finger painting. The same is true for music. The delightful chaos of Charles Ives music is interpreted by some as noise. The value of all art can cannot be quantized but, indeed, “is in the eye of the beholder.” The degree to which art is held in high regard can be emotionally manipulated. A great example is Read More ›

Space and Galaxy light speed travel. Elements of this image furnished by NASA.

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post

Robert J. Marks
Date
June 29, 2021

Categorized
Mathematics, Science

Tagged
Big Bang, Conservation of Information (COI), Introduction to Evolutionary Informatics (book), Jacob Bernoulli, John Maynard Keynes, No Free Lunch theorems}

No Free Lunches: Bernoulli is Right, Keynes is Wrong

_{What the Big Bang teaches us about nothing} _{Robert J. Marks
June 29, 2021

5

Mathematics, Science}

Jacob Bernoulli made a now obvious observation about probability over three-and-a-half centuries ago: If nothing is known about the outcome of a random event, all outcomes can be assumed to be equally probable. Bernoulli’s Principle of Insufficient Reason (PrOIR) is commonly used. Throw a fair die. There are six outcomes, one for each face of the cube. The chance of getting five pips showing on the roll of a die is therefore one sixth. If a million lottery tickets are sold and you buy one ticket, the chances of winning are one in a million. This reasoning is intuitively obvious. The assumption about the die is wrong if the die is loaded. But you don’t know that. You know nothing. So Bernoulli’s PrIOR Read More ›

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post

Robert J. Marks
Date
June 23, 2021

Categorized
Artificial Intelligence, Military

Tagged
Angel Has Fallen (film), Drone swarms, electromagnetic pulses (EMPs), Faraday cage, Paul Scharre, Russia, Slaughterbots (film), The Case for Killer Robots}

The Most Promising Defense Against Militarized Drone Swarms

_{An EMP ray beam could disable an AI swarm like a can of bug spray against a swarm of ants} _{Robert J. Marks
June 23, 2021

5

Artificial Intelligence, Military}

Want to be scared about a use of artificial intelligence in the military? Watch the leftist video Slaughterbots or the beginning of the movie Angel Has Fallen starring drone-targeted Morgan Freeman. Swarms are hard to defeat. Kicking over an ant hill and stomping on most of the agents in a swarm doesn’t derail the ants’ collective mission. Come back in a week and the anthill is rebuilt. Likewise, if all of the agents in a drone swarm aren’t taken out, the drone swarm can still accomplish its mission. As I mention in The Case for Killer Robots, autonomous swarms of drones are among the scariest applications of AI in military weapons. Russia has developed and tested military drone swarms. So has the United States military. General John Read More ›

Statue of Saint Anselm and the towers of the Cathedral of Aosta, the Cattedrale di Aosta de Corso Pere-Laurent in Aosta. Aosta Valley. Italy. Europe

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post

Robert J. Marks and Samuel Haug
Date
June 7, 2021

Categorized
Mathematics, Religion

Tagged
Anselm of Canterbury, Axioms, Definitions, God's existence, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, Kurt Gödel, Kurt Gödel (belief in God), ontological proof, Theorems}

Gödel Says God Exists and Proves It

_{Here is a line-by-line explanation of his proof} _{Robert J. Marks and Samuel Haug
June 7, 2021

8

Mathematics, Religion}

Kurt Gödel, an intellectual giant of the 20th century, offered a mathematical proof that God exists. Those who suffer from math anxiety admire what the theorem (shown below) claims to do, but have absolutely no idea what it means. Our goal is to explain, in English, what Gödel’s existence of God proof says. Gödel’s proof shows the existence of God is a necessary truth. The idea behind the truth is not new and dates back to Saint Anselm of Canterbury (1033-1109). Great scientists and philosophers, including Descartes and Leibniz, have reconsidered and refined Anselm’s argument. Gödel appears to be the first, however, to present the argument using mathematical logic. Lexicography In any development of a mathematical theory, there are foundational axioms Read More ›

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post

Robert J. Marks
Date
June 1, 2021

Categorized
Artificial Intelligence, Natural Intelligence

Tagged
Alexa, Artificial Intelligence, drones, Futurism, Gaming AI (book), George Dvorsky, George Gilder, Human exceptionalism, John Searle, Killer robots, Paul Scharre, Roger Penrose, Selmer Bringsjord, The Case for Killer Robots, Thomas Edison}

Chicken Little AI Dystopians: Is the Sky Really Falling?

_{Futurist claims about human-destroying superintelligence are uninformed and irresponsible} _{Robert J. Marks
June 1, 2021

6

Artificial Intelligence, Natural Intelligence}

The article “How an Artificial Superintelligence Might Actually Destroy Humanity” is one of the most irresponsible pieces about AI I have read in the last five years. The author, transhumanist George Dvorsky, builds his argument on a foundation of easily popped balloons. AI is and will remain a tool. Computers can crunch numbers faster than you or me. Alexa saves a lot of time looking up results on the web or playing a selected tune from Spotify. A car – even a bicycle – can go a lot faster than I can run. AI is a tool like fire or electricity used to enhance human performance and improve lifestyles. Like fire and electricity, AI can be used for evil or Read More ›

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post

Robert J. Marks
Date
May 13, 2021

Categorized
Media, Peer Review, Science

Tagged
Featured, Google Scholar, Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE)), Scholarly Publishing}

Inside the Economics of Science Papers

_{Here’s an inside look at who pays if you read for free} _{Robert J. Marks
May 13, 2021

6

Media, Peer Review, Science}

When a scholarly paper is published, someone has to pay. Publishers like Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE), my professional society, and Springer charge big bucks to read their papers. The fees are billed to individual subscribers and, more commonly, to companies and universities who want to give their employees access to the papers. My own university, Baylor, like most research universities, has a considerable library budget on account of these publisher fees. There is growing pressure to kill these fees in favor of “open access” to scholarly papers. Thus, anyone can read a scholarly paper at any time for free. Free access takes the money from the pockets of publishers so they push back. Someone has to pay, Read More ›