from Hacker News

Ask HN: What about actual Artificial Intelligence?

by gtsop on 2/11/25, 7:53 PM with 4 comments

Is it not apparent that a trully intelligent system would be able to learn or discover new knowledge while running instead of being a box pre-fed with tons of data? Don't get me wrong, there have been remarkable advances in ML, but are we really going to pretend that spitting out existing knowledge is intelligence? Volume and accuracy of knowledge being spit out is not intelligence (however admirable and usefull).

When Pythagoras figured out his theorem he displayed true intelligence that can we cannot lay claim uppon when we repeat the already-gained knowledge. One can display the same level of intelligence if they figure out the theorem while having nothing but the limited knowledge he had.

It seems obvious to me, then, that true artificial intelligence will be able to re-discover knowledge we didn't feed into it, and discover new knowledge using that same mechanism.

And of course the VC sphere will ignore this as long as what is currently branded AI makes money, but what of the HN crowd? how can we ignore this?

  • by hmmokidk on 2/11/25, 9:09 PM

    Artificially creating thought is not possible. Maybe it’s possible to link existing brains to computers, grow a brain in a lab(?), anything else will basically be some lowly form of mimicry and a far cry from actual thought. I don’t think we will be able to reproduce what nature does to be fair. Unless somehow we bridge the gap between the digital and biological world, which would be neat although extremely morbid. Somehow getting a mouse brain to solve something, attached to a computer?

    This is completely out of my ass. I think that’s the best anyone can give you at this point in time.

  • by jqpabc123 on 2/11/25, 8:40 PM

    A lot of what is being credited to AI is really just data retrieval.

    The small portion that is truly new and unique and novel is often the result of trial and error.

    This can be useful but it doesn't really qualify as "intelligence" in my opinion.