Platt Holden (pholden@worldnet.att.net)
Mon, 20 Oct 1997 20:27:46 +0100
Hi Magnus,
Platt wrote:
There are several SOM paradoxes in the MOQ itself. For example, the
quality of the rational Metaphysics of Quality cannot be proved by rational
thought. Still, so long as we admit to being in a rational SOM mode,
self-contradictory assertions need to be challenged. When we want to go
beyond the SOM mode, we can drop in a poem like Maggie's "Lord of the
Dance." (Platt's test for AI is to have one computer make sense of a poem
written by another computer.)
Magnus replied:
Then who decides it *is* a poem in the first place? And who decides that
the sense made of it is ok?
I was hoping you would pick up on that. It goes to the heart of a huge
platypus in intellect's logical pattern, the platypus of "who decides?" For
instance, the scientific method depends on verification. But who verifies
the verifier? Before you know it, you're into infinite regress.
Enter a social pattern. To prevent infinite regress, verification relies on
communal confirmation. That is, to verify a proposition, others following
the same assumptions, context and methodology used by the originator should
arrive at the same conclusion. Science bases its truths on others being
able to repeat experiments, thereby requiring a social element.
The great advantage science has over other means of establishing truth is
that scientific social verification is tied to data provided by biological
patterns. The validity of evolutionary theory relies on measurements of
tangible bones. The validity of quantum theory relies (please correct me
here) on measurements of particle traces seen on a computer screen.
But, to verify the meaning or "truth" of Shakespeare's "Hamlet" or Pirsig's
"Metaphysics of Quality" is another matter. In that case, verification
depends not on physical measurement but on the social and intellectual
patterns of those who have seen the play or read Lila and who are qualified
to render a judgment based on life experience, philosophical understanding
and educated opinion. Biological patterns, while not entirely irrelevant,
are not as critical to the verification process as they are in science.
Given that a social element is required in any verification, and given that
a poem and the making sense thereof is not subject to scientific
verification, the Al test I propose will necessarily require a panel of
qualified "experts" to decide if its a poem and if the sense made of it is
OK.. Similarly, the Lila Squad is a panel of self-appointed qualified
experts judging the validity and value of the MoQ.
Of course, we could always hook up another Al computer to determine if the
first computer created a poem, and another computer to check up on that,
and another to check on that, ad infinitum. Which is why I believe true Al,
one able to mimic the entire spectrum of human capabilities, will always be
just an intellectual pattern's dream.
So in one sense we end up with Doug's "many truths." Trouble is, that
assertion is self-contradictory because it is framed as a single truth. And
around and around we go again. Ultimately, the only thing that stops
infinite regress and answers the question, "Who decides?" is one's own
innate sense of quality. It stops when an individual human decides, "That's
a good truth."
Platt
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