What if giant AIs really do usher in true intelligence? (1)
If AI is a good analogue for brains, and in particular the human brain, then it wouldn’t be a surprise if increasing the power/complexity by making bigger AIs would lead to activity we would see as resembling that of the human brain, both desired and undesired (9 October, p 36).
For example, as AI structures come to “resemble” human ones, will they show features such as sensory illusions and even neuroses and psychoses? If so, would we be able to recognise these and what would be the significance of such behaviour by an AI?
What if giant AIs really do usher in true intelligence? (2)
The question of scale as it pertains to the ability of a computer to become self-aware, a possible precondition of artificial general intelligence, has been explored at least as far back as 1966. In his book The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, Robert Heinlein described the human brain as having 1010 neurons (actually, only about an eighth of the current estimate of 86 billion), then described a computer as having one-and-a-half as many “neuristors”, and how it came “alive”.
Given that the GPT-3 AI discussed in your article is reported to have 175 billion artificial neurons (twice that of a human brain), Heinlein would expect human-like behaviour to appear shortly.
What if giant AIs really do usher in true intelligence? (3)
Is the result of GPT-3 so surprising? Intelligence is an emergent property, so increasing the number of network parameters is almost certainly bound to increase intelligence. A key next step, already hinted at by science fiction authors, is to give neural networks vision and hearing senses. I suspect that the results will be even more surprising, and I wonder if different AIs of this type can develop different personalities.
High gas price may be just what is required
It is interesting to observe the media and political reaction to the natural gas price spike discussed in your recent leader article (Leader, 25 September). This price may be one that some people see as more representative of its true environmental cost.
If sustained, this should be the incentive needed to get us to decarbonise at the rate we should have been doing for many years.
A few more ways to try to cut food waste
How to cut food waste? Consider non-plastic storage options like airlock glass containers and reusable, beeswax-covered cloth as a plastic wrap alternative (25 September, p 42).
Waste can also be reduced with a focus on properly stored, naturally long-lasting foods such as cold-stored cruciferous and root veggies, jar-stored nuts, dried fruit, grains and beans. Cooking from dried is a good non-waste option.
Few home truths about quantum computer rise
Regarding growing governmental interest in quantum computing, the rise of this technology threatens two unstoppable shifts that may change everything (2 October, p 20).
These computers will sooner or later make easy work of cracking our best encryption, laying bare decades of secrets and lies. Secondly, quantum-empowered AI will have the ability to detect when someone is lying, even from archived news footage.
The climate in which politicians and corporate executives work is about to become very transparent.
Bin tax may mean keeping rubbish under lock and key
The “pay-as-you-throw” concept of a bin tax has a flaw that would need to be addressed: it requires lockable bins (25 September, p 18).
It is common for others to put rubbish in my bin, and this would get much worse if there were a bin tax. Lockable bins would be expensive, and as all the waste collection teams would need a master key, this would rapidly become ineffective.
Breezy Blighty should be fine for overnight charge
Liz Bell worries that tapping electric vehicle batteries at night as a means to provide grid storage will mean they aren’t fully charged in the morning (Letters, 25 September). The main problem a renewables grid has is with demand in the evening. For the UK, with plentiful wind, there will be time enough to power up all the cars between, say, 11pm and 6am.
Here in Australia, we will have a higher share of solar. Everyone charging vehicles overnight will perpetuate demand for fossil fuels, while an excess of supply in daytime will undermine the profitability of solar farms. We need it to be easy to recharge EVs in the daytime, at commuter car parks and shopping centres.
Freeze your faeces for a later-life rejuvenation
In “Young at gut”, the possible anti-ageing value of faecal transplants was explained (2 October, p 38). There was a caveat that transplants from one person to another would meet “resistance from other resident flora”.
Might this be addressed by developing storage for early age faeces, similar to that used for sperm or eggs, so that a person could receive a later transplant of their own material?
Does quantum realm explain my error ratio?
Even though I’m resigned to never understanding quantum shenanigans, my brain went into hyper-boggle on reading that “for the first time, a quantum computer has demonstrated an error-correction strategy that fixes more errors than it creates” (9 October, p 9).
However, it does explain where all the errors come from in my work: they are from a quantum dimension. Here, among collapsing functions, I will continue my good old-fashioned system of creating more errors than I fix.
For the record 鈥� {23 October 2021}
In our look at the potential role of gut microbes in longevity (2 October, p 38), we should have said the many species of the Firmicutes and Bacteroidetes groups have varied dietary preferences.