Stephen Downes

I've set up a Cloudron installation - it's currently costing me about $25 per month ($15 for the Cloudron pro license and another $10 for the web server space). I don't know whether it will replace everything I'm using and paying for elsewhere but it will certainly replace some things. It's all a big experiment.

I often see arguments that show an original bit of text and a close duplicate output by a large language model (LLM) offered as evidence that the neural networks that make up an LLM must store copies of the text they are quoting. Here's an example from Gary Marcus.

Tim Klapdor's main point is both the challenge and the issue: "intelligence requires understanding & meaning. Therefore, if you want to call something intelligent, then it must be able to exhibit understanding and meaning." OK, sounds great, until you push a bit on what counts exactly as'understanding' and 'meaning'. What is 'understanding'? Knowledge of causal principles? Not robust enough. General laws and principles? Too inflexible. A model or world view? Sure, now we're getting closer. But that's what AIs do! Kids learning 'why'- what sort of answer do you give them? Cause, principles, theory. Right? So what is there to'understanding' that AIs don't do. The same sort of questions arise around'meaning'. Do we mean'intentionality'?'Intensionality?' "emotions or tone" Aw, we already know AI can respond to these. It's too easy to simply say "understanding & meaning." Image: University of Tennessee, Multiple Intelligences Theory (not a big leap from where we are in this post).

I've wrestled with the question of whether there can be an'artificial intelligence' over the last few days. The question of course comes down to what we think 'intelligence'is, and whether we think it is something unique to humans, or at the very least, something beyond the capacity of a computer or machine.

Goodness, I hate working with public and private keys. But that's the only way to access Reclaim containers by SSH (for SSH file transfer and SSH terminal access).

On a trip to see family in a country known for its culinary excellence, a former Financial Review restaurant critic finds both delights and disappointments.

2 Mei 2024 A Couple Of Items That Caught My Attention Filed under: sekolah virtual — Michael K. Barbour @ 12:05

Bernard Pivot, did more than any other French journalist to get people to read, joined the extinct writers he loved.

The Financial Times reports, and Larry Sanger confirms, that Sanger is leaving Citizendium to work on (the more commercially viable?) Watchknow. "At best, Citizendium could be called a qualified success. Launched in March 2007, it currently lists 11,810 articles - 2,999,674 fewer than the English-language version of Wikipedia."

"Is Wikipedia," asks Steve Wheeler, "dying a slow death?" That might be a fair conclusion to draw following this report, "that Wikipedia has lost 49,000 editors in just a few months." Larry Sanger, who created Citizendium as a response to Wikipedia, suggests