What Exactly IS Intelligence? (The nature of a \'Creator\')

by romansh , Thursday, August 19, 2010, 04:47 (4991 days ago) @ dhw

BBella defined intelligence as "goal oriented problem solving energy", while George preferred "problem solving ability". Romansh suggests "the ability of an entity to synthesize at least one response that is correlated with at least one stimulus."
So the gadgetry in a car that seeks the goal of optimum fuel consumption is intelligent? Actually this meets the definition I quoted.
> Romansh has already debated this topic on another forum, so first of all thank you for reviving it on ours, as I don't think we really delved very deep. You gave me a good laugh with your response to your own definition: "We end up asking how intelligent is a brick ... not whether it is". I could just imagine the intelligent brick synthesizing its disintegration under the sledgehammer. The problem-solving definition ignores the fact that you need to be intelligent even to realize that there IS a problem. (I shan't go into the implications of my own inability to solve most of the problems I'm confronted with.)
Although the brick thing was meant to be amusing it was only partly in jest. Your response is anthropic in nature - which is fair enough. But just using the development of a human being as an example, at which point does a human being become intelligent or is it a grey scale extending back in time?-> You have come to the conclusion that "intelligence is deeply entwined with the concepts of consciousness, life, free will" etc., and I find that more helpful than the definitions offered so far. How about "a conscious ability to perceive, learn, understand and think about things, and to apply the knowledge thereby acquired"? 
To be a little more accurate I should have said ... "our concept of intelligence is deeply entwined ... " As it happens I'm deeply skeptical of free will, life and consciousness or at least the way these things are traditionally treated.-Regarding your definition - hey it's OK, I'm not going to argue, it's probably as good as any other. But it is again a very anthropic definition. Don't you think?