There is a fundamental difference between form and meaning. Form is the physical structure of something, while meaning is the interpretation or concept that is attached to that form. For example, the form of a chair is its physical structure – four legs, a seat, and a back. The meaning of a chair is that it is something you can sit on.This distinction is important when considering whether or not an AI system can be trained to learn semantic meaning.

Scott Aaronson

Bully Pulpit

This is the third in my ongoing series of posts about Elon Musk’s quest to buy Twitter. In the first of the series, I pointed out that Twitter’s CEO might be woefully out of his depth, and the board has failed to do its job. Twitter founder and former CEO, Jack Dorsey agreed with me. I later pointed out that, there is no (motivated) buyer (just yet) other than Musk. In this third piece, I point out that Elon’s intentions are entirely self-serving. And why not. What’s the point of having billions if you can’t protect your self-interests. Continue reading Bully Pulpit