Quote

Societies need rules that make no sense for individuals. For example, it makes no difference whether a single car drives on the left or on the right. But it makes all the difference when there are many cars!

Marvin Minsky

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Marvin Minsky
Age: 88 †
Born: 1927
Born: August 9
Died: 2016
Died: January 24
Artificial Intelligence Researcher
Computer Scientist
Mathematician
Scientist
University Teacher
New York City
New York
Marvin Lee Minsky
Marvin L. Minsky
Make
Individual
Individuals
Sense
Rules
Left
Car
Makes
Difference
Need
Single
Right
Example
Drives
Many
Differences
Societies
Needs
Whether
Cars

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I cannot articulate enough to express my dislike to people who think that understanding spoils your experience... How would they know?
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In science, one learns the most by studying what seems to be the least.
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Common sense is not a simple thing. Instead, it is an immense society of hard-earned practical ideas - of multitudes of life-learned rules and exceptions, dispositions and tendencies, balances and checks.
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General fiction is pretty much about ways that people get into problems and screw their lives up. Science fiction is about everything else.
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All intelligent problem solvers are subject to the same ultimate constraints - limitations on space, time, and materials.
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If we understood something just one way, we would not understand it at all.
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The principal activities of brains are making changes in themselves.
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You don't understand anything unless you understand there are at least 3 ways.
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No computer has ever been designed that is ever aware of what it's doing but most of the time, we aren't either.
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