Computers Are Incapable Of Creatively Writing Music

Is the mind the same as the body? What is consciousness? Can machines have it?

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Terrapin Station
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Re: Computers Are Incapable Of Creatively Writing Music

Post by Terrapin Station »

SteveKlinko wrote: Mon Apr 19, 2021 12:59 pm
Terrapin Station wrote: Sun Apr 18, 2021 12:53 pm
SteveKlinko wrote: Sun Apr 18, 2021 12:31 pm You're ignoring my answer. I will interpret for you. Although we will never know what anything is actually like, but we can learn enough about things
How? You're positing that we can't actually observe externals. So how do you learn "enough about them"? How does the process start? Describe how it supposedly works in some detail under the premise that we can't actually observe what externals are like.

This is why you're ignoring the question.
The Conscious Visual Experience that is embedded in the front of your face is the thing you look at to get information about the External World. The External World actually doesn't Look like anything. What does it really mean to See something? Your conception of Seeing is completely formed by how your Visual System operates and not by any kind of real Seeing of External things. You never actually See the External World but rather you are always just seeing this screen. The screen portrays the External World for you in order to enable you to move around in that World. It is a pretty good portrayal for that purpose.
I don't know if you don't understand what I'm asking you?

If you can't see the external world, then how do you see how anyone's visual system operates? (That is, how are you seeing eyes, retinas, how are you studying how they work, etc.?)

And if you can't see the external world, then how could you know that it "actually doesn't look like anything"? You'd need to see what it's like in order to check that. Otherwise it would have to be a complete guess.

And if you can't see or otherwise experience an external world, then how are you even positing one? It would again be a complete guess.
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Re: Computers Are Incapable Of Creatively Writing Music

Post by SteveKlinko »

Terrapin Station wrote: Mon Apr 19, 2021 1:08 pm
SteveKlinko wrote: Mon Apr 19, 2021 12:59 pm
Terrapin Station wrote: Sun Apr 18, 2021 12:53 pm
How? You're positing that we can't actually observe externals. So how do you learn "enough about them"? How does the process start? Describe how it supposedly works in some detail under the premise that we can't actually observe what externals are like.

This is why you're ignoring the question.
The Conscious Visual Experience that is embedded in the front of your face is the thing you look at to get information about the External World. The External World actually doesn't Look like anything. What does it really mean to See something? Your conception of Seeing is completely formed by how your Visual System operates and not by any kind of real Seeing of External things. You never actually See the External World but rather you are always just seeing this screen. The screen portrays the External World for you in order to enable you to move around in that World. It is a pretty good portrayal for that purpose.
I don't know if you don't understand what I'm asking you?

If you can't see the external world, then how do you see how anyone's visual system operates? (That is, how are you seeing eyes, retinas, how are you studying how they work, etc.?)

And if you can't see the external world, then how could you know that it "actually doesn't look like anything"? You'd need to see what it's like in order to check that. Otherwise it would have to be a complete guess.

And if you can't see or otherwise experience an external world, then how are you even positing one? It would again be a complete guess.
I suppose the Necessary Subtlety of my answer just eludes you. Sorry, I don't understand what you don't understand.
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Re: Computers Are Incapable Of Creatively Writing Music

Post by Terrapin Station »

SteveKlinko wrote: Mon Apr 19, 2021 1:12 pm
Terrapin Station wrote: Mon Apr 19, 2021 1:08 pm
SteveKlinko wrote: Mon Apr 19, 2021 12:59 pm
The Conscious Visual Experience that is embedded in the front of your face is the thing you look at to get information about the External World. The External World actually doesn't Look like anything. What does it really mean to See something? Your conception of Seeing is completely formed by how your Visual System operates and not by any kind of real Seeing of External things. You never actually See the External World but rather you are always just seeing this screen. The screen portrays the External World for you in order to enable you to move around in that World. It is a pretty good portrayal for that purpose.
I don't know if you don't understand what I'm asking you?

If you can't see the external world, then how do you see how anyone's visual system operates? (That is, how are you seeing eyes, retinas, how are you studying how they work, etc.?)

And if you can't see the external world, then how could you know that it "actually doesn't look like anything"? You'd need to see what it's like in order to check that. Otherwise it would have to be a complete guess.

And if you can't see or otherwise experience an external world, then how are you even positing one? It would again be a complete guess.
I suppose the Necessary Subtlety of my answer just eludes you. Sorry, I don't understand what you don't understand.
So you'd be answering, for example, HOW we're knowing how anyone's visual system operates if we can't see the external world. You would say something akin to "We can't see the external world, but we can know how visual systems work via . . . " and then you would explain, in at least some modest detail, with some plausibility to it given the premise (that we can't see the external world), how the epistemic process there would work. You're not at all doing this. You're just repeating the claims you believe a la how a telemarketer meets objections.
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Re: Computers Are Incapable Of Creatively Writing Music

Post by SteveKlinko »

Terrapin Station wrote: Mon Apr 19, 2021 1:25 pm
SteveKlinko wrote: Mon Apr 19, 2021 1:12 pm
Terrapin Station wrote: Mon Apr 19, 2021 1:08 pm

I don't know if you don't understand what I'm asking you?

If you can't see the external world, then how do you see how anyone's visual system operates? (That is, how are you seeing eyes, retinas, how are you studying how they work, etc.?)

And if you can't see the external world, then how could you know that it "actually doesn't look like anything"? You'd need to see what it's like in order to check that. Otherwise it would have to be a complete guess.

And if you can't see or otherwise experience an external world, then how are you even positing one? It would again be a complete guess.
I suppose the Necessary Subtlety of my answer just eludes you. Sorry, I don't understand what you don't understand.
So you'd be answering, for example, HOW we're knowing how anyone's visual system operates if we can't see the external world. You would say something akin to "We can't see the external world, but we can know how visual systems work via . . . " and then you would explain, in at least some modest detail, with some plausibility to it given the premise (that we can't see the external world), how the epistemic process there would work. You're not at all doing this. You're just repeating the claims you believe a la how a telemarketer meets objections.
So are you a Naïve Realist? In other words, do you think you See the External World as it is? If you are, I understand your Confusion. You do not understand, or you reject, the known process of how we See. If that is the case I cannot help you. You are stuck at the first Level of Understanding for the Human Visual Experience. See https://theintermind.com/#Levels.
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Re: Computers Are Incapable Of Creatively Writing Music

Post by Skepdick »

SteveKlinko wrote: Mon Apr 19, 2021 1:07 pm This one of the worst Chop Jobs on a simple line of reasoning that you have done so far. Please stop taking each sentence out of context. The sentences express a Line Thought that you have obliterated.
Your "line of thought" is about as clear as diarrhoea in a bathtub.

You've appropriated the language of the Phenomenologists and you are using it completely out of context. You don't understand phenomenology but you speak about phenomena.
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Re: Computers Are Incapable Of Creatively Writing Music

Post by Terrapin Station »

SteveKlinko wrote: Mon Apr 19, 2021 4:45 pm
Terrapin Station wrote: Mon Apr 19, 2021 1:25 pm
SteveKlinko wrote: Mon Apr 19, 2021 1:12 pm
I suppose the Necessary Subtlety of my answer just eludes you. Sorry, I don't understand what you don't understand.
So you'd be answering, for example, HOW we're knowing how anyone's visual system operates if we can't see the external world. You would say something akin to "We can't see the external world, but we can know how visual systems work via . . . " and then you would explain, in at least some modest detail, with some plausibility to it given the premise (that we can't see the external world), how the epistemic process there would work. You're not at all doing this. You're just repeating the claims you believe a la how a telemarketer meets objections.
So are you a Naïve Realist? In other words, do you think you See the External World as it is? If you are, I understand your Confusion. You do not understand, or you reject, the known process of how we See. If that is the case I cannot help you. You are stuck at the first Level of Understanding for the Human Visual Experience. See https://theintermind.com/#Levels.
And he has no answer to what he's been asked. That must be the "next level" lol
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Re: Computers Are Incapable Of Creatively Writing Music

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SteveKlinko wrote: Mon Apr 19, 2021 4:45 pm See https://theintermind.com/#Levels.
By the way, re that paper (which I'm guessing is yours maybe?), the hypothetical folks in the scenario aren't quite as bright as they believe they are, because at least when they arrived at this, for example: "The Light was now understood to be something Inside of us"--they should have said, "Hold on a minute. We reached that conclusion via studying the external world, including light waves, as well as studying eyes, optic nerves, etc. BUT if our conclusion from all of that winds up being that we only observed something inside of us, then we didn't actually observe the external world, or light waves, or eyes, or optic nerves, or anything like that at all. So that completely pulls the rug out from the conclusion we just reached based on the assumption that we DID observe and study that stuff."

And that's what I'm asking you about that you're completely avoiding, because it doesn't go with the gospel that you've bought into, hook, line and sinker.
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Re: Computers Are Incapable Of Creatively Writing Music

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Skepdick wrote: Mon Apr 19, 2021 4:51 pm
SteveKlinko wrote: Mon Apr 19, 2021 1:07 pm This one of the worst Chop Jobs on a simple line of reasoning that you have done so far. Please stop taking each sentence out of context. The sentences express a Line Thought that you have obliterated.
Your "line of thought" is about as clear as diarrhoea in a bathtub.

You've appropriated the language of the Phenomenologists and you are using it completely out of context. You don't understand phenomenology but you speak about phenomena.
I have never said anything about Phenomenology. I talk about known Phenomena of Science. Nothing to do with Philosophical Phenomenology. Nice try.
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Re: Computers Are Incapable Of Creatively Writing Music

Post by SteveKlinko »

Terrapin Station wrote: Mon Apr 19, 2021 5:39 pm
SteveKlinko wrote: Mon Apr 19, 2021 4:45 pm See https://theintermind.com/#Levels.
By the way, re that paper (which I'm guessing is yours maybe?), the hypothetical folks in the scenario aren't quite as bright as they believe they are, because at least when they arrived at this, for example: "The Light was now understood to be something Inside of us"--they should have said, "Hold on a minute. We reached that conclusion via studying the external world, including light waves, as well as studying eyes, optic nerves, etc. BUT if our conclusion from all of that winds up being that we only observed something inside of us, then we didn't actually observe the external world, or light waves, or eyes, or optic nerves, or anything like that at all. So that completely pulls the rug out from the conclusion we just reached based on the assumption that we DID observe and study that stuff."

And that's what I'm asking you about that you're completely avoiding, because it doesn't go with the gospel that you've bought into, hook, line and sinker.
Let me put it this way. We are definitely Seeing our Brain/Mind internal Representation of the External World. The purpose of this Representation is to Detect the External World so we can operate in it. And so yes, we Observe and Study that Representation of the External World. The only things we can know about the External World is gotten by Observing that Representation. We can invent Instruments that enhance our abilities to Observe, such as Microscopes, Telescopes, Infrared Cameras, etc.. But whatever we Visually Observe will be filtered into an Internal Representation. There will probably be a down side to this Detection Mechanism. But you seem to take the possibility of a down side of this to an extreme by thinking that there is no Representation that will let us discover things and understand the External World. Is that what you are saying?
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Re: Computers Are Incapable Of Creatively Writing Music

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SteveKlinko wrote: Tue Apr 20, 2021 12:51 pm Let me put it this way. We are definitely Seeing our Brain/Mind internal Representation of the External World. The purpose of this Representation is to Detect the External World so we can operate in it. And so yes, we Observe and Study that Representation of the External World. The only things we can know about the External World is gotten by Observing that Representation. We can invent Instruments that enhance our abilities to Observe, such as Microscopes, Telescopes, Infrared Cameras, etc.. But whatever we Visually Observe will be filtered into an Internal Representation. There will probably be a down side to this Detection Mechanism. But you seem to take the possibility of a down side of this to an extreme by thinking that there is no Representation that will let us discover things and understand the External World. Is that what you are saying?
That doesn't look like anything I said, so no, it's probably not what I'm saying.

I know that the above is your view. I'm very familiar with that view, so you do not need to keep relaying what the view is.

What I'm doing is posing a challenge to that view. This is a challenge that you're going to need to think about, all on your own, because you're not going to find an answer to what I'm asking you in the view itself or in any of the usual commentary about the view. So you need to spend time thinking about this and come up with an answer on your own.

So asking in the context of the above: if the view is that you can ONLY see (or sense in general; it wouldn't be limited to vision, obviously) an internal "representation" of the "external world" (in quotation marks because that's how it should be stated given what the view is positing), then on what grounds would you be positing that there even is an external world that you're experiencing a representation of at all? What would plausibly epistemically justify that, given that the view is that you can only experience something "internal"? (We can later deal with what "internal" versus "external" would even amount to on this view.)
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Re: Computers Are Incapable Of Creatively Writing Music

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Not to play at semantics, but possibly to move the discussion along, a better word than “representation” might be “simulation”—in a simulation of the external environment there must be an external environment to be simulated.

I expect pushback on this from both sides. Nonetheless it puts the question of whether there’s an external world into a neatly wrapped package.
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Re: Computers Are Incapable Of Creatively Writing Music

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commonsense wrote: Tue Apr 20, 2021 2:16 pm Not to play at semantics, but possibly to move the discussion along, a better word than “representation” might be “simulation”—in a simulation of the external environment there must be an external environment to be simulated.

I expect pushback on this from both sides. Nonetheless it puts the question of whether there’s an external world into a neatly wrapped package.
That would just be the same thing. What would be the grounds for classifying something as a "simulation" or for positing an external thing that's simulated, IF the premise is that we can only experience the "simulation"?

In other words, that's just changing the terms we're using, but not the ideas and the problems with them (given certain claims made in context).
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Re: Computers Are Incapable Of Creatively Writing Music

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To put it simply, the real problem here is that people studying things like perception reached conclusions about how it works that suggested that we're often not seeing the external world as we assume we are, and then that was carried to an extreme of saying, "We only experience a representation period," BUT, somehow that line of reasoning completely overlooked the problem that if we only experience a "representation," then we have no way of claiming that we studied perceptual systems to reach the conclusions we reached in the first place.

It's like traveling from New York to Boston and then concluding that it's impossible to do so. There's obviously a problem with the theory in that case.
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Re: Computers Are Incapable Of Creatively Writing Music

Post by commonsense »

Terrapin Station wrote: Tue Apr 20, 2021 2:19 pm
commonsense wrote: Tue Apr 20, 2021 2:16 pm Not to play at semantics, but possibly to move the discussion along, a better word than “representation” might be “simulation”—in a simulation of the external environment there must be an external environment to be simulated.

I expect pushback on this from both sides. Nonetheless it puts the question of whether there’s an external world into a neatly wrapped package.
That would just be the same thing. What would be the grounds for classifying something as a "simulation" or for positing an external thing that's simulated, IF the premise is that we can only experience the "simulation"?

In other words, that's just changing the terms we're using, but not the ideas and the problems with them (given certain claims made in context).
I disagree with you there, and here’s why. A simulation cannot be a simulation unless there is a real thing to simulate, an external environment in this case. A representation can exist even when it references the internal alone.

But if you view simulations and representations the same, then so be it.
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Re: Computers Are Incapable Of Creatively Writing Music

Post by SteveKlinko »

Terrapin Station wrote: Tue Apr 20, 2021 1:06 pm
SteveKlinko wrote: Tue Apr 20, 2021 12:51 pm Let me put it this way. We are definitely Seeing our Brain/Mind internal Representation of the External World. The purpose of this Representation is to Detect the External World so we can operate in it. And so yes, we Observe and Study that Representation of the External World. The only things we can know about the External World is gotten by Observing that Representation. We can invent Instruments that enhance our abilities to Observe, such as Microscopes, Telescopes, Infrared Cameras, etc.. But whatever we Visually Observe will be filtered into an Internal Representation. There will probably be a down side to this Detection Mechanism. But you seem to take the possibility of a down side of this to an extreme by thinking that there is no Representation that will let us discover things and understand the External World. Is that what you are saying?
That doesn't look like anything I said, so no, it's probably not what I'm saying.

I know that the above is your view. I'm very familiar with that view, so you do not need to keep relaying what the view is.

What I'm doing is posing a challenge to that view. This is a challenge that you're going to need to think about, all on your own, because you're not going to find an answer to what I'm asking you in the view itself or in any of the usual commentary about the view. So you need to spend time thinking about this and come up with an answer on your own.

So asking in the context of the above: if the view is that you can ONLY see (or sense in general; it wouldn't be limited to vision, obviously) an internal "representation" of the "external world" (in quotation marks because that's how it should be stated given what the view is positing), then on what grounds would you be positing that there even is an external world that you're experiencing a representation of at all? What would plausibly epistemically justify that, given that the view is that you can only experience something "internal"? (We can later deal with what "internal" versus "external" would even amount to on this view.)
We are assuming there is an External World based on our Internal representation that shows us that there is an External World. Now if you are talking about the Speculation that the World is a Simulation then that is a different topic, but ...

From the Inter Mind Website:
Even if Reality is a Simulation we obviously still have Conscious Experiences of that Reality. So there is probably still a Conscious Mind (CM) doing the Experiencing in Conscious Space (CSp). There is probably still an Inter Mind (IM) but it would now connect the CM to the Simulation instead of to a Physical Mind (PM). There are two basic types of Simulations that we can talk about. One type is a Simulation that just runs with us being helpless observers having no ability to affect things that are happening in the Simulation. This means that all our desires, strivings, and actions are just something we experience, but we really can't do anything about anything. The Simulation makes us think we have desires and strivings and that we can do things. In this type of Simulation the CM would have no Volitional connections back to the Simulation and would only have connections from the Simulation to the IM and then to the CM. In the other type the CM can, through Volitional connections through the IM and to the Simulation, affect things in the Simulation similar to how the CM can, through the IM, affect things in Physical Space (PSp). The Simulation will make us believe we are actually in PSp, but there would be no difference for us if we were in an Actual Physical Universe or a Simulated Physical Universe. The take away from this is that it doesn't matter if the IM is connected to a PM or to a Simulation.
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