From: Amara D. Angelica (amara@kurzweilai.net)
Date: Tue May 14 2002 - 01:03:46 MDT
Kurzweil reviews Wolfram’s book, 'A New Kind of Science'
KurzweilAI.net, May 14, 2002
May 14 -- In "A New Kind of Science," published today by Wolfram Media,
Stephen Wolfram asserts that cellular automata -- simple programs
repetitively run -- underlie much of the real world. He even says the entire
Universe itself is a big cellular-automaton computer.
But these ideas can't fully explain the complexities of life, intelligence,
and physical phenomena, says Ray Kurzweil. "He over-generalizes the limited
power of complexity resulting from simple computational processes. One could
run these automata for trillions or even trillions of trillions of
iterations, and the image would remain at the same limited level of
complexity. They do not evolve into, say, insects, or humans, or Chopin
preludes."
There is a "missing link here in how one gets from the interesting, but
ultimately routine patterns of a cellular automaton to the complexity of
persisting structures that demonstrate higher levels of intelligence."
However, Kurzweil concludes, "Wolfram has added to our knowledge of how
patterns of information create the world we experience. I believe the book
to be an important work of ontology."
Read the full article: Reflections on Stephen Wolfram’s "A New Kind of
Science"
http://www.kurzweilai.net/meme/frame.html?main=/articles/art0464.html
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