Partial Knowledge

Knowledge is the source of all intelligence. Human have the most efficient knowledge processing technology in the brain that can process vast amount of data acquired from sensory organs, extract useful information from it, reconcile new information with existing knowledge, and finally store it for efficient, almost instantaneous retrieval when needed. But, knowledge acquisition is a murky process like all the physical processes. There are lot of imperfections at all levels. Raw data is corrupted, noisy, biased, dependent on state of numerous variables. Information extraction from raw data is dependent on prior prejudices, current state of mind, and future expectations. There are always unpredictable human agents around us trying to influence how we acquire new knowledge, how we form our beliefs. In a way, mind is in a continuous struggle with past and surroundings, to make sense out of world around it.

In this scenario what helps brain is its ability to acquire partial knowledge based on partial conclusions. Partial knowledge is in a way a game of probabilities. Brain adjusts its beliefs as more and more imperfect knowledge is acquired, hoping that in the long run its beliefs are more or less in line with what is actually happening around it. Imperfect knowledge is also easy to acquire, and scalable with amount of data available. It is more difficult to form firm beliefs than to form loose beliefs that can be adjusted with time and experience. 

In contract, it is difficult for deterministic machines to form partial beliefs. It is more easy for them to believe 1+1 is 2 than to allow for other possibilities based on constantly changing variables. This is  an important reason why intelligent machines are still quite far away. They are very primitive as of now.