[krystyn]

Collective intelligence made me better at Halo.

[notgordian]

A study of this sort really does need clearer boundaries -- some limited forms have already occurred.

For instance, Perplex City has posed the "Billion 2 One" challenge (currently unsolved) and semi-jokingly asked for a proof to the "Reiman Hypothesis" (also unsolved).

On another note, Simon Singh released a series of 10 encrypted messages to go along with "The Code Book" -- although not collective intelligence per se, it involved a number of different teams tackling the same problem concurrently and resulted in improving algorithms.

The problem is, a sufficiently challenging puzzle must evoke enough interest to draw the attention of a "collective intelligence" -- and ideally it would need to be designed by a "collective intelligence", since the assumption is it should be do-able but beyond the capabilities of a single person, no matter how smart.

In fact, designing the problem itself would probably be the ideal assignment for a collective intelligence as proof of concept. Recursive, ain't it.

[Rogi Ocnorb]

Would it also be good to make the task one that doesn't allow for ANY hints, helps, pushes or other interactive communication?
Strictly a task with a well-defined and measurable goal for success.
That would do away with any possible redefinition of the final goal due to various "leveling" activities that might occur during the run and reduce any emotional bias or hurt feelings in either direction.
Or... Is that a given?

[vpisteve]

Hmm, from my perspective you're looking to disprove the existence of gravity, but hey, whatever floats your boat.

ETA: From reading your subject and subject description, you're really not clear on exactly what it is you're trying to disprove. The existence of a distributed hive mind that can very quickly solve complex problems, or an ARG that can solve 9/11??

If that's the case, the first one's gravity to me, while the second one is a perpetual motion machine.

[FLmutant]

Mind if I play along, Silent? It would seem to test that hypothesis you'd need to make sure:

1. There was a real solution possible (giving them the Voynich manuscript will always produce failure.)

2. Since it is collective, it needs to be something that isn't really solvable by any one person (so that it doesn't become a "can the community recruit the right resource" test.)

3. It can't be something that just requires group participation, or it isn't really testing the "intelligence" part (ie, SETI@Home isn't intelligent, it is just efficient.)

The more interesting question to me is WHY it fails, Silent. Not because I don't believe it exists, just because I believe it is an emergent property of something else. Maybe. It might just be self-organizing and not emergent. Or it might be emergent and not self-organizing.

I suspect it will fail because of the trust factor: the inherant belief that a fictional construct is created "solvable" produces a certain level of tenacity in pursuing that solution. I'm not sure how you would prove that without having a control -- one with a fictional construct that hid the fact a real CI task was hidden inside of it, and one without such a fictional construct where the CI task is explicit. I don't have direct evidence to support this idea except for the implosion rate in the games and what I generally describe as the "pirhana factor" (where the audience that were advocates become the fiercest critics.)

Interesting thought experiment in the very least: my gut says the emphemeral "CI" is more of a description of collaboration in general (any musician or performer can talk about "up time" where non-verbal communication between an entire ensemble and audience affects where the artistic output goes.) For many people, that experience of collaboration seems new ... or seems larger than it is because of media forms that spread out that experience over time.

Collaboration junkies

[elfis]

Re: Experiment Into Collective Intelligence

[Rogi Ocnorb]

*Rogi looks up the current addresses for Donald and Bettye Harden to ask if they'll be on his team.

[Silent]

Experiment Into Collective Intelligence