A few days ago I lost some data including recent code changes. Today I'm trying to recreate the same code changes - i.e. work I've just recently worked through - and for the life of me I can't get it to work the same way again. Even though "just" that is what I set out to do in the first place - no improvements, just to do the same thing over again.
Throwing a dart could not be further away from programming a computer. It's one of the most deterministic things we can do. If I write if(n>0) then the computer will execute my intent with 100% accuracy. It won't compare n to 0.005.
You see arguments like yours a lot. It seems to be a way of saying "let's lower the bar for AI". But suppose I have a laser guided rifle that I rely on for my food and someone comes along with a bow and arrow and says "give it a chance, after all lots of things we do are inaccurate, like throwing darts for example". What would you answer?
Actually no wait let’s expand it. Why not go say this to Ronnie O’Sullivan too!
The way you’re describing is such that there is no determinism behind what is being done. Simply not true.
It’s undeniable that humans exhibit stochastic traits, but we’re obviously not stochastic processes in the same sense as LLMs and the like. We have agency, error-correction, and learning mechanisms that make us far more reliable.
In practice, humans (especially experts) have an apparent determinism despite all of the randomness involved (both internally and externally) in many of our actions.
Something so complex that we cannot model it as deterministic is hence stochastic. We can just as easily model a stochastic thing by ignoring the stochastic parts.
separating subjective appearance of things from how we can conceptualise them as models begs a deeper philosophical question of how you can talk about the nature of things you cannot perceive.
