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Re:The function that gives AI value is the ability to make p... by sewercake on Tuesday July 10, 2018 @04:16PM (#17501703)
hmm. This might just be a clarification of terms, but couldn't you say that 'predicting' something is merely a type of conclusion where the information used in the process of reasoning is incomplete or noisy?

So all predictions are conclusions but not all conclusions are predictions. I.e, a deductive argument comes to a conclusion, but, as we know, inferential methods aren't deductive.

Re:The function that gives AI value is the ability to make p... by jeffmcmahan on Tuesday July 10, 2018 @04:28PM (#17501833)
Humans are not predicting what a photo depicts when they look at it. They more or less immediately come to a definite conclusion.
Re:The function that gives AI value is the ability to make p... by venachescu on Tuesday July 10, 2018 @07:21PM (#17503071)
No, we are absolutely predicting when we are looking at a photo; firstly, we really do not see the ‘whole thing’, our eyes make quick, stereotyped (cough predictive cough) movements to a few spots on the image and mentally imagine the rest. Secondly, that’s assuming we recognized something in the image, if it’s unclear, like a grainy photo or lots of shadows, we start to make informed guesses about what could be there.

All of our sensory systems work this way - we use an enormous amount of context to bubble up predictive categories and the collect marginal amounts of information until one prediction dominates over all others.

When one doesn’t, we get gestalt like illusions; like the cubes that are projected both forwards or backwards - or dresses that are blue and black and white and gold - or laurel and yanni in perfect harmony, etc.

Re:The function that gives AI value is the ability to make p... by sewercake on Tuesday July 10, 2018 @04:57PM (#17502081)
Some people disagree: https://www.quantamagazine.org/to-make-sense-of-the-present-...

This is a pop-sci article, so take it with a grain of salt, but there is a growing body of research that attempts to frame many cognitive processes as inherently predictive (inferential?). I think this view arises pretty naturally when you start thinking about us having a 'model' of reality that we is updated based on sensory information, but I digress.

I think I see where you're coming from.

A human might not be 'predicting', since the term has some kind of temporal element connotation. But we could say that it's 'inferring' what the photo represents?

Re:The function that gives AI value is the ability to make p... by pnloyd on Tuesday July 10, 2018 @04:41PM (#17501958)
Ya that's what I was basing my comment on mostly. I do understand your parents reasoning though, although it is comming from a more logical perspective than I was.

I was commenting from the perspective of an analogy from personal experience of my own conscious.