Sunday, October 17, 2010

Arthur Schopenhauer - World as Will and Idea (Representation) and Theories of Intellience, Mind, AGI, Artificial General Intelligence

I first read one of the books of the philosopher Schopenhauer during the period of my Teenage Theory of Mind and Universe*. I noticed it reminded me of my concepts, so it seemed meaningful. :)

I think his philosophy is related to the context of AGI, he has even tried to apply neuroscience, as far as first half of XIX century has allowed. There is a free copy of his major book at

A lot of Schopenhauer's essays can be found as well.

In my opinion, he shares some ideas that Boris has developed further.

(Translation - mine, from Bulgarian, some attributes missed)

"...practical person applies his intelligence according to its purpose predetermined by nature - to comprehend the relations between things, partially one to another and partially compared to the will of the individual who cognizes. On the other hand the genius uses his intelligence against its purpose - to understand the objective nature of things. Because of the advanced cognitive capability the genius cognizes to a higher extent the generality in things, rather than the individual, while serving to Will mostly requires cognition of the individual ("specifics")." --- Specialists vs Generalists

"(...) All of the great theoretical discoveries of any kind are achieved because their author directed all of his spiritual power towards one single point, where he links and concentrates the power to extent where this point occupies his entire reality and the rest of the world disappears for him." -- Detachment and Focus

Etc., a lot could be cited. I haven't read all yet, only beginnings and parts - couldn't afford the time lately, but I'll try/

* "Teenage Theory of Mind and Universe" - significant parts of it are available in English already, but not published yet.