Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!clyde.concordia.ca!uunet!mcsun!ukc!mucs!liv-cs!ian
From: ian@mva.cs.liv.ac.uk
Newsgroups: comp.ai
Subject: Re: A definition of *INTELLIGENCE*
Message-ID: <5177.25fa2fb6@mva.cs.liv.ac.uk>
Date: 11 Mar 90 11:00:05 GMT
References: <2752@castle.ed.ac.uk> <1407@oravax.UUCP>
Organization: Computer Science CSMVAX, Liverpool University
Lines: 28

In article <1407@oravax.UUCP>, ian@oravax.UUCP (Ian Sutherland) writes:
> In article <2752@castle.ed.ac.uk> aighb@castle.ed.ac.uk (Geoff Ballinger) writes:
>>
>>	An intelligent system is aware of both itself and it's
>>environment (and the relationship between the two) and can respond
>>accordingly. 
>>
> 
> Comment 1:  what do you mean by "aware", particularly when applied to
> the system itself?
> 
> Comment 2: what does it mean to respond "accordingly"?
> 
Exactly!  The original statement shifts the search for a definition of
`intelligent' to a search for definitions of `aware' and `respond
accordingly'.  Of course, if these two terms can be more easily pinned down
than `intelligence', we're getting somewhere (if we want to define
intelligence).  I'm not sure that they can!  To dig out an old example, I'm
pretty sure that your definition of intelligence could be applied to a
thermostat!

I feel that any definition of intelligence should have a context.  In some
circumstances it may be useful to ascribe intelligence to a thermostat (for
example when telling a very small child how a room stays the same
temperature), even though normally it would not.

Ian
---