[dojomouse]

I think it’s very much a magical fantasy computer :-) A thought experiment, rather than a claim to something that’s been built or exists.

The questions you pose are interesting ones, for the sake of the experiment I think at least:

- Programming

- Loading new software

- Adding new functionality

- Persisting user data

Could all at least in principle be achieved without changing the network architecture, but rather just providing the relevant data at the inputs (eg the full bit stream of the install file of the new software being installed) and having that lead to adjustments in activations (not weights or architecture) across the network which lead to any future inputs to the network resulting in the outputs that would be expected in the presence of the new software. Same deal for the other examples.

As to whether this is practical or achievable at present - not even remotely close in my view. But it’s still an interesting idea, even if just to think about why it wouldnt work and what that implies for future development direction of multimodal networks etc.

[Someone]

> I think it’s very much a magical fantasy computer :-) A thought experiment, rather than a claim to something that’s been built or exists.

I think this kind of computer exists and is called ”brain”.

[thesuperbigfrog]

>> I think this kind of computer exists and is called ”brain”.

True, but there are ethical and rights considerations unless you are building / growing an artifical brain.

You can't just grab a human or sufficiently-suitable animal brain and turn them into your personal mentat (https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Organizations_of_...) or computing servitor (https://warhammer40k.fandom.com/wiki/Servitor) to do your computing for you. (At least, not ethically.)

Where would you get a brain to train?

Also, it's not easy to train human / animal brains in their natural state as any parent / animal trainer can attest.