Philosophy and Artificial Intelligence 2021
Barry Smith
MAP, USI, Lugano, Spring 2021
Schedule
Monday February 22 2021 14:30 - 17:15: Some examples of philosophical problems
Introduction to the class
What is computation?
What is a language
- The Turing Test and the problem of natural language production
What is consciousness?
What is will?
Can machines have a will?
What is intentionality?
Readings:
- John Searle: Minds, Brains, and Programs
- Jobst Landgrebe and Barry Smith: There is no Artificial General Intelligence
Tuesday February 23 2021 14:30 - 17:15 The Impossibility of Digital Immortality
Part One: Immortality
Transhumanism and Identity: Can we download the contents of our brains onto a computer and become immortal?
Why you cannot exist outside your body
Readings:
- Martine Rothblatt: Mind is Deeper Than Matter [TO BE SUPPLIED AT USI SITE]
- Scott Adams: We are living in a simulation
- AI and The Matrix
Part Two: Intelligence
The classical psychological definitions of intelligence are:
- A. the ability to adapt to new situations (applies both to humans and to animals)
- B. a very general mental capability (possessed only by humans) that, among other things, involves the ability to reason, plan, solve problems, think abstractly, comprehend complex ideas, learn quickly, and learn from experience
What are the essential marks of human intelligence?
For consideration in Wednesday's session: to what extent can artificial intelligence be achieved?
Readings:
- Linda S. Gottfredson. Mainstream Science on Intelligence. In: Intelligence 24 (1997), pp. 13–23.
Wednesday February 24, 2021 14:30 - 16:00: The Legg-Hutter Definition of 'Universal Intelligence'
What is it that researchers and engineers are trying to do when they talk of achieving ‘Artificial Intelligence’?
To what extent can AI be achieved?
Problems with the Legg-Hutter Definition of Intelligence
Readings:
- Shane Legg and Marcus Hutter: Universal Intelligence: A Definition of Machine Intelligence
- Jobst Landgrebe and Barry Smith: Making AI Meaningful Again
Friday February 26 2021 16:30 - 18:00 AI Ethics
Jobst Landgrebe) is the founder and CEO of Cognotekt, GmBH, an AI company based in Cologne specialised in the design and implementation of holistic AI solutions. He has 16 years experience in AI field, 8 years as a management consultant and software architect. He has also worked as a physician and mathematician.
What is the basis of ethics as applied to humans?
- Utilitarianism
- Value ethics
On what basis should we build an AI ethics?
On why AI ethics is (a) impossible, (b) unnecessary
Readings:
- Moor: Four kinds of ethical robots
- Jobst Landgrebe and Barry Smith: No AI Ethics
- Crane: The AI Ethics Hoax
Wednesday May 12 2021 14:30 - 17.15 Brain Emulation
Can we build an AI by emulating the brain?
Can we build an AI by any other method?
Chalmers on Brain Emulation
Chalmers on Artificial Evolution
Readings:
- David J. Chalmers: The Singularity: A Philosophical Analysis
- David J. Chalmers: The Singularity: A Reply to Commentators
Friday May 14 2021 09:30 - 12:15: AI and Ontology
Basic Formal Ontology (BFO) (ISO/IEC 21838-2)
Applications of BFO in AI
Upper Level Ontologies
DOLCE
Applications to Emotions
Student Presentations
- Tommaso Soriani: Of (Zombie) Mice and Animats
- Giacomo De Colle: Mind Embodied and Embedded
Monday May 17 2021 14:30 - 17:15 AI and the Ontology of Complex Systems
- AI is a family of algorithms to automate repetitive events
- AI is not artificial intelligence; it is a branch of mathematics in which the attempt is made to use the Turing machine to its limits by using gigantically large amounts of data
- What sorts of problems can AI not solve?
- Paper:There is no general AI
Student presentations
- Maria Andromachi Kolyvaki: Statistical Learning Theory as a Framework for the Philosophy of Induction.
- Ismaele Affini: The Ugly Truth About Ourselves and Our Robot Creations: The Problem of Bias and Social Inequity
- Anita Buckley: The limits of machine intelligence
- Osama Kahlil: Trolleyology: "Would you kill the fat man?"
Tuesday May 18 2021 14:30 - 17:15 Language+
- An Ontology of Terrorism
- Sentiment Analysis
- An Ontology of Language
- Language+Behaviour
- Language+Violence
- Slides
Student presentations
- Rwiddhi Chakraborty: The Myth of Hypercomputation
- Amir Sulic: Why general AI will not be realized
- Brian Pulfer: The Singularity and Machine Ethics
Wednesday May 19 2021 14:30 - 17:15 First Dialogue with Jobst Landgrebes
- AI and the Mathematics of Complex Systems
- Slides
Thursday May 20 2021 13:30 - 16:15 Second Dialogue with Jobst Landgrebe
- AI and the Ontology of Power
Course Description
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is the subfield of Computer Science devoted to developing programs that enable computers to display behavior that can (broadly) be characterised as intelligent. On the strong version, the ultimate goal of AI is to create an artificial system that is as intelligent as a human being. Recent striking successes such as AlphaGo have convinced many not only that this objective is obtainable but also that in a not too distant future machines will become even more intelligent than human beings.
The actual and possible developments in AI open up a series of striking questions such as:
- Can a computer have a conscious mind?
- Can it have desires and emotions?
- Would machine intelligence, if there is such a thing, be something comparable to human intelligence or something quite different?
In addition, these developments make it possible for us to consider a series of philosophical questions in a new light, including:
- What is personal identity? Could a machine have something like a personal identity? Would I really survive if the contents of my brain were uploaded to the cloud?
- What is it for a human to behave in an ethical manner? (Could there be something like machine ethics? Could machines used in fighting wars be programmed to behave ethically?)
- What is a meaningful life? If routine, meaningless work in the future is performed entirely by machines, will this make possible new sorts of meaningful lives on the part of humans?
After introducing the relevant ideas and tools from both AI and philosophy, all the aforementioned questions will be thoroughly addressed in class discussions following lectures by Drs Facchini and Smith and presentations of relevant papers by the students.
Further Background Reading
- Gerald J. Erion and Barry Smith, “In Defense of Truth: Skepticism, Morality, and The Matrix”, in W. Irwin (ed.), Philosophy and The Matrix, La Salle and Chicago: Open Court, 2002, 16–27.
- Max More and Natasha Vita-More (Eds.), The Transhumanist Reader: Classical and Contemporary Essays on the Science, Technology, and Philosophy of the Human Future, Wiley-Blackwell, 2013.
