Mind Matters Natural and Artificial Intelligence News and Analysis

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COSM2022-Nov10-174A0113-blake-lemoine-panel
Type
post
Author
News
Date
March 23, 2023
Categorized
Artificial Intelligence
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Lemoine at COSM 2022: A Conversation on AI and LaMDA

Will AI ever become "sentient"?
News
March 23, 2023
1
Artificial Intelligence

Blake Lemoine, ex-Google employee and AI expert, sat down with Discovery Institute’s Jay Richards at the 2022 COSM conference last November. Together they discussed AI, Google, and how and why Lemoine got to where he is today. Lemoine famously claimed last year that LaMDA, Google’s breakthrough AI technology, had achieved sentience. Lemoine explains that many people at Google thought AI had the potential for sentience, but that such technology should not be made prematurely for fear of the negative impacts it could have on society. You can listen to their interesting and brief conversation in the video below, and be sure to see more sessions from the 2022 COSM conference featuring Lemoine and other leaders and innovators in technology on Read More ›

chatgpt-chat-concept-ai-artificial-intelligence-businessman-using-technology-smart-robot-ai-enter-command-prompt-contact-for-business-information-analysis-futuristic-technology-transformation-stockpack-adobe-stock
ChatGPT Chat concept AI, Artificial Intelligence. businessman using technology smart robot AI, enter command prompt, contact for business information analysis, Futuristic technology transformation.
Type
podcast
Author
Robert J. Marks and Jeffrey Funk
Date
March 16, 2023
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Jeffrey Funk on AI, Startups, and Big Tech

Robert J. Marks and Jeffrey Funk
March 16, 2023
1

In this podcast episode, technology consultant and author Jeffrey Funk joins Robert J. Marks to talk about the artificial intelligence industry, how it’s used by Big Tech, and AI’s exaggerated hype.  How do we respond to AI when technology is changing every year? Additional Resources

brain-psychology-mind-soul-and-hope-concept-art-3d-illustration-surreal-artwork-imagination-painting-conceptual-idea-stockpack-adobe-stock
Brain psychology mind soul and hope concept art, 3d illustration, surreal artwork, imagination painting, conceptual idea
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post
Author
News
Date
March 9, 2023
Categorized
Artificial Intelligence
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Blake Lemoine and Robert J. Marks on the Mind Matters Podcast

Marks and Lemoine discuss sentience in AI and the question of the soul
News
March 9, 2023
1
Artificial Intelligence

Robert J. Marks, director of the Walter Bradley Center for Natural & Artificial Intelligence, sat down with former Google employee Blake Lemoine, who made headlines last year when he claimed AI can be “sentient.” The claim also led to his departure from Google. The two had a fascinating conversation, to say the least. In today’s episode, they discuss whether AI can indeed become sentient, the non-computability of certain human traits, and the question of the soul. Marks and Lemoine couldn’t differ more on these fundamental points. Whereas Lemoine thinks AI can be sentient, Marks firmly rejects such a notion. In addition, Lemoine’s materialistic worldview controls his understanding of the brain, while Marks defends the existence of the immaterial mind. While Read More ›

digital-fractal-realms-stockpack-adobe-stock
Digital Fractal Realms
Type
podcast
Author
Robert J. Marks
Date
March 9, 2023
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Blake Lemoine and the LaMDA Question

Robert J. Marks
March 9, 2023
1

In this continuation of last week’s conversation, ex-Googler Blake Lemoine tells Robert J. Marks what originally got him interested in AI: reading the science fiction of Isaac Asimov as a boy in rural Louisiana. The two go on to discuss and debate sentience in AI, non-computable traits of human beings, and the question of the soul. Additional Resources

touching chatbot
Chatbot computer program designed for conversation with human users over the Internet. Support and customer service automation technology concept.
Type
podcast
Author
Robert J. Marks
Date
March 2, 2023
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A Chat with Blake Lemoine on Google and AI Sentience

Robert J. Marks
March 2, 2023
1

Former Google employee Blake Lemoine claimed that the Large Language Model LaMDA was a sentient being. The claim got him fired. In this episode, Lemoine sits down with Robert J. Marks to discuss AI, what he was doing at Google, and why he believes artificial intelligence can be sentient.   Additional Resources

artificial-intelligence-sentient-ai-thinking-for-itself-using-computational-data-and-a-human-like-sense-of-consciousness-and-conscience-generative-ai-stockpack-adobe-stock
Artificial intelligence - sentient AI thinking for itself using computational data and a human-like sense of consciousness and conscience. Generative AI
Type
post
Author
News
Date
March 1, 2023
Categorized
Artificial Intelligence
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Ex-Googler Blake Lemoine Still Thinks AI is Sentient

Lemoine posits that because AI can appear to act anxious and stressed, it can be assumed to be sentient
News
March 1, 2023
1
Artificial Intelligence

Blake Lemoine, who formerly worked for Google, has doubled down on his claim that AI systems like LaMDA and Chat-GPT are “sentient.” Lemoine went public on his thoughts on sentience in The Washington Post last June with his bold claim, and since parting ways with Google, has not backed down on his beliefs. Lemoine posits that because AI can appear to act anxious and stressed, it can be assumed to be sentient. Maggie Harrison writes at Futurism, An interesting theory, but still not wholly convincing, considering that chatbots are designed to emulate human conversation — and thus, human stories. Breaking under stress is a common narrative arc; this particular aspect of machine behavior, while fascinating, seems less indicative of sentience, Read More ›

computer-eye-stockpack-adobe-stock
Computer Eye
Type
post
Author
Peter Biles
Date
February 24, 2023
Categorized
Artificial Intelligence
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The Metaverse was a Bust. Will AI Save the Day?

Microsoft is counting on it, investing billions into AI research and development
Peter Biles
February 24, 2023
3
Artificial Intelligence

Just a couple of years ago, the metaverse was taking the tech world captive with grandiose promises of revolutionizing the internet and representing the future of human interaction. Microsoft was among the moguls who embraced the metaverse project with open arms, only to face the harsh fact that the technology was underdeveloped, investors were skeptical of its viability, and a massive swath of the American public seemed simply uninterested in the product. But, it was new technology. It was exciting. It was supposed to be the future. Now, Microsoft is hailing AI as the destiny of the internet, again with the sort of optimism that directed their love affair with virtual reality. The company has jumped the gun and sought Read More ›

little bot boi
Businessman holding a light chatbot hologram intelligence AI. Digital chatbot, chatGPT, robot application.Chat GPT chat with AI Artifice intelligent developers digital technology concept.
Type
post
Author
Gary Smith and Jeffrey Funk
Date
February 21, 2023
Categorized
Artificial Intelligence
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Does New A.I. Live Up to the Hype?

Experts are finding ChatGPT and other LLMs unimpressive, but investors aren't getting the memo
Gary Smith and Jeffrey Funk
February 21, 2023
7
Artificial Intelligence

Original article was featured at Salon on February 21st, 2023. On November 30, 2022, OpenAI announced the public release of ChatGPT-3, a large language model (LLM) that can engage in astonishingly human-like conversations and answer an incredible variety of questions. Three weeks later, Google’s management — wary that they had been publicly eclipsed by a competitor in the artificial intelligence technology space — issued a “Code Red” to staff. Google’s core business is its search engine, which currently accounts for 84% of the global search market. Their search engine is so dominant that searching the internet is generically called “googling.” When a user poses a search request, Google’s search engine returns dozens of helpful links along with targeted advertisements based on its knowledge of the Read More ›

hand in searchbar
Hand click searching data information networking. Concept for network web and technology
Type
post
Author
Jonathan Bartlett
Date
February 6, 2023
Categorized
Artificial Intelligence
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Whatever You Do, Don’t Ask GPT for Sources

The chatbot will give you a lot of links that don't necessarily direct you where you want to go
Jonathan Bartlett
February 6, 2023
4
Artificial Intelligence

One of the more amusing things I’ve found from OpenAI’s GPT-3 and ChatGPT is the fact that it will very confidently provide you with sources on anything you ask—and they will often be completely made up. It will even provide fake (but real-looking) URLs for you! I stumbled across this feature when researching a previous GPT-3 article about how well it could write blog posts compared to real authors. I initially tried asking GPT-3 to include sources, and it generated complete nonsense for the sources. I decided that, for that article, sources were not the main question, so I left it out of the final queries. However, in response to my latest article about ChatGPT not being a Google replacement, someone commented Read More ›

person at the internet
Business man works in office with laptop. Concept of internet network. double exposure
Type
post
Author
Jonathan Bartlett
Date
January 30, 2023
Categorized
Artificial Intelligence
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Why ChatGPT Won’t Replace Google

With Google, the algorithm eventually leads you to content made by real people. With ChatGPT, you never leave the algorithm
Jonathan Bartlett
January 30, 2023
2
Artificial Intelligence

To some extent, ChatGPT is a newer, easier-to-use interface than Google.  Unlike Google, it doesn’t make you waste time by visiting those pesky websites.  It not only looks into its database for content, but it also summarizes it for you as paragraphs. There is a problem lurking in there, however.  Being computers, neither Google nor ChatGPT cares about the truth.  They are algorithms, and they merely do as they are told.  Additionally, you can’t code the human mind into algorithms.  However, there is a fundamental difference between what ChatGPT does and what Google does that will prevent content generators like ChatGPT from displacing search engines like Google: Google eventually lets you out of its system. Ultimately, the goal of search Read More ›

google on ipad
Bangkok, Thailand 25 AUG 2020. Men hand using digital tablet for search information on Google. Wireless Smartphone technology with intelligence search engine.
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post
Author
News
Date
January 25, 2023
Categorized
Law, Media
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U.S. Department of Justice Sues Google (Again)

The DOJ claims the tech giant is unlawfully monopolizing the digital advertising market
News
January 25, 2023
2
Law, Media

The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) is suing Google, claiming the technology company has monopolized the digital advertising market. This marks the second federal anti-trust suit against Google. Google has led the digital advertising market for years, although companies like TikTok and Amazon are becoming more viable competitors. Despite the competition, Google still raked in $209B in advertising in 2021, per a briefing from 1440 News, and its 2022 financial report is expected to disclose similar numbers. The official complaint notes the benefit and importance of a “vibrant internet” in American life but emphasizes the centrality of economic diversity and competition. Section 4 of the complaint claims “the ad tech space is broken,” further explaining,   One industry behemoth, Google, Read More ›

white glove stage
Hand in a white glove pulling curtain away
Type
post
Author
Nathan Jacobson
Date
January 1, 2023
Categorized
Censorship, Social Media
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Google: Rank Censorship Behind the Scenes

We live under a state of highly sophisticated and ubiquitous suppression of disfavored voices
Nathan Jacobson
January 1, 2023
10
Censorship, Social Media

One year ago today (January 1st, 2022) we saw behind the curtain at Google. With vast information scattered across a billion websites, whoever controls the search algorithm largely controls information. And if Google.com were a stage, the spotlight is centered squarely on the first result, with some ambient light spilling onto a few supporting roles. The second page results are essentially extras, unlikely to catch the attention of the audience at all. About 25% of web searchers click that first result. Another 50% follow one of the next half-dozen. A scant 6% will ever make it to the second page.* If your breaking news, breakthrough product, or bold opinion piece isn’t in a starring role on that first page, it will languish Read More ›

Customer service and support live chat with chatbot and automati
Type
post
Author
Gary Smith
Date
December 26, 2022
Categorized
Artificial Intelligence
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Chatbots: Still Dumb After All These Years

Intelligence is more than statistically appropriate responses
Gary Smith
December 26, 2022
7
Artificial Intelligence

This story, by Pomona College business and investment prof Gary Smith was #6 in 2022 at Mind Matters News in terms of reader numbers. As we approach the New Year, we are rerunning the top ten Mind Matters News stories of 2022, based on reader interest. At any rate: “Chatbots: Still dumb after all these years.” (January 3, 2022) In 1970, Marvin Minsky, recipient of the Turing Award (“the Nobel Prize of Computing”), predicted that within “three to eight years we will have a machine with the general intelligence of an average human being.”  Fifty-two years later, we’re still waiting. The fundamental roadblock is that, although computer algorithms are really, really good at identifying statistical patterns, they have no way of Read More ›

multiple-smartphone-screens-adobe-stock
Multiple smartphone screens
Type
podcast
Author
Andrew McDiarmid and Doug Smith
Date
November 24, 2022
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Getting Intentional About Your Screens

Andrew McDiarmid and Doug Smith
November 24, 2022
1
Our obsession today with screens is, often unintentionally, taking us to places we regret. We use these windows into the world for hours every day, often unaware how intentional content creators and app designers are in shaping our decisions and forming harmful habits. Read More ›
Hacker Cyborg. Combination of robot and artificial intelligence
Type
podcast
Author
Robert J. Marks
Date
June 30, 2022
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AI: The Potential and the Problems

Robert J. Marks
June 30, 2022
2

Despite the hype regarding the seemingly infinite possibilities surrounding AI technology, artificial intelligence still has a number of humbling hurtles to overcome. Justin Bui and Samuel Haug join Robert J. Marks to discuss the latest developments in artificial intelligence.  Show Notes 00:00:56 | The Homunculus 00:04:09 | Introducing Justin Bui 00:06:54 | Fast AI 00:13:45 | Deepfake Technology 00:21:40 | Read More ›

strichcode-stockpack-adobe-stock
Strichcode
Type
post
Author
News
Date
May 12, 2022
Categorized
Business and Finance, Surveillance
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What You Need To Know About Surveillance Capitalism

A Harvard professor coined the term and her 2019 book sounds a warning about how Google and Facebook gain power and wealth selling YOU
News
May 12, 2022
4
Business and Finance, Surveillance

The term “surveillance capitalism” was coined by Harvard professor Shoshana Zuboff in her book The Age of Surveillance Capitalism: The Fight for a Human Future at the New Frontier of Power. It’s a fascinating read, offering insight into the power that companies like Google and Facebook have amassed and the danger that power poses to our way of life. Here’s how she explained it to the United Kingdom’s Channel 4 News in 2019: Here’s how surveillance capitalism works, just in brief. It begins with these companies claiming, unilaterally claiming, our private human experience as their free source of raw material. So what do they do with that raw material? They lift out of it the rich predictive signals in our Read More ›

puppet-hands-from-leadership-controlling-our-lives-concept-stockpack-adobe-stock
Puppet hands from leadership controlling our lives. Concept
Type
podcast
Author
Andrew McDiarmid
Date
April 21, 2022
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How to Sever Big Tech’s Strings

Andrew McDiarmid
April 21, 2022
1

Doug Smith, author of [Un]Intentional: How Screens Secretly Shape Your Desires and How You Can Break Free, explains to Andrew McDiarmid how we can escape the subtle influence of Big Tech. He also emphasizes the importance of removing ourselves from our screens so we can enjoy the outside world and recapture our creativity. Show Notes 00:38 | Introducing Doug Smith Read More ›

Man showing tricks with cards
Type
post
Author
Gary Smith
Date
March 21, 2022
Categorized
Artificial Intelligence
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The AI Illusion – State-of-the-Art Chatbots Aren’t What They Seem

GPT-3 is very much like a performance by a good magician
Gary Smith
March 21, 2022
11
Artificial Intelligence

Artificial intelligence is an oxymoron. Despite all the incredible things computers can do, they are still not intelligent in any meaningful sense of the word. Decades ago, AI researchers largely abandoned their quest to build computers that mimic our wondrously flexible human intelligence and instead created algorithms that were useful (i.e., profitable). Despite this understandable detour, some AI enthusiasts market their creations as genuinely intelligent. For example, a few months ago, Blaise Aguera y Arcas, the head of Google’s AI group in Seattle, argued that “statistics do amount to understanding.” As evidence, he cites a few exchanges with Google’s LaMDA chatbot. The examples were impressively coherent but they are still what Gary Marcus and Ernest Davis characterize as “a fluent spouter of bullshit” because computer algorithms Read More ›

cropped-shot-of-robot-playing-chess-on-wooden-surface-stockpack-adobe-stock
cropped shot of robot playing chess on wooden surface
Type
post
Author
Eric Holloway
Date
February 28, 2022
Categorized
Artificial Intelligence, Natural Intelligence
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Is AlphaZero Actually Superior to the Human Mind?

Comparing AI and the human mind is completely apples and oranges
Eric Holloway
February 28, 2022
3
Artificial Intelligence, Natural Intelligence

The Google-backed AI company DeepMind made headlines in March 2016 when its AlphaGo game AI engine was able to defeat Lee Sedol, one of the top Go players in the world. DeepMind followed up this great achievement with the AlphaZero engine in 2017, which made the remarkable achievement of soundly beating AlphaGo in Go as well as one of the world’s best chess engines in chess. The interesting difference between AlphaGo and AlphaZero is that AlphaGo uses databases of top human games for learning, while AlphaZero only learns by playing against itself. Using the same AI engine to dominate two different games, while also discarding reliance on human games suggests that DeepMind has found an algorithm that is intrinsically superior Read More ›

closeup keyboard laptop and Google Ads AdWords app icon on smart
closeup keyboard laptop and Google Ads AdWords app icon on smartphone screen. Google is the biggest Internet search engine in the world. Moscow, Russia - April 27, 2019
Type
post
Author
Caitlin Bassett
Date
January 21, 2022
Categorized
Law, Social Media
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Facebook and Google Face Big Legal Challenges

The FTC, dozens of states, and private citizens are coming after the big tech companies for antitrust violations
Caitlin Bassett
January 21, 2022
7
Law, Social Media

How has 2022 begun for our favorite Big Tech companies? With a good chunk of lawsuits. As technology companies grow bigger, they face bigger legal challenges. Here’s a brief rundown of a few such challenges Facebook and Google face in the courts in this new year: FTC Antitrust Lawsuit Against Facebook Moves Forward Let’s begin at the federal level. Last June, Judge James E. Boasberg of the U.S. District Court of the District of Columbia tossed out a lawsuit from the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) challenging Facebook’s acquisition of Instagram and WhatsApp. According to Boasberg, the FTC failed to adequately show that Facebook holds a monopoly. Not to be dissuaded, the FTC re-filed with an amended complaint in August. Last Read More ›