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AIList Digest Volume 7 Issue 045
AIList Digest Sunday, 26 Jun 1988 Volume 7 : Issue 45
Today's Topics:
Philosophy:
Re: Cognitive AI vs Expert Systems
Re: Ding an sich
the legal rights of robots
possible value of AI
metaepistemology
H. G. Wells
Smoliar's metaphor
more on dance notation
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Date: 22 Jun 88 15:10:39 GMT
From: mikeb@ford-wdl1.arpa (Michael H. Bender)
Subject: Re: Cognitive AI vs Expert Systems
I think terms like "hard AI" and "soft AI" are potentially offensive
and imply a set of values (i.e. some set of problems being of more
value than others). Instead, I highly recommend that you use the
distinctions proposed by Jon Doyle in the AI Magazine (Spring 88),
in which he distinguishes between the following (note - the short
definitions are MINE, not Doyle's)
o COMPUTATIONAL COMPLEXITY ANALYSIS - i.e. the search for
explanations based on comutational complexity
o ARTICULATING INTELLIGENCE - i.e. codifying command and expert
knowledge.
o RATIONAL PSYCHOLOGY - i.e. the cognitive science that deals
with trying to understand human thinking
o PSYCHOLOGICAL ENGINEERING - i.e. the development of new
techniques for implementing human-like behaviors and
capacities
Note - using this demarcation it is easier to pin-point the different
areas in which a person is working.
------------------------------
Date: 22 Jun 88 15:31:22 GMT
From: steinmetz!vdsvax!thearlin@uunet.UU.NET (Thearling Kurt H)
Reply-to: steinmetz!vdsvax!thearlin@uunet.UU.NET (Thearling Kurt H)
Subject: Re: Ding an sich
In an earlier article, John McCarthy writes:
>meaningful and possible that the basic structure of the
>world is unknowable. It is also possible that it is
>knowable. It just depends on how much of the structure
>To illustrate this idea, consider the Life cellular
>automaton proposed by John Horton Conway and studied
>by him and various M.I.T. hackers and others. It's
>described in Winning Ways by Berlekamp, Conway and
>Guy.
There is a very interesting article related to this topic
in the April 1988 issue of Atlantic Monthly. It is about
the semi-controversial physicist/computer scientist Edward
Fredkin and is titled "Did the"Did the Universe Just Happen."
An interesting quote from the article is "Fredkin believes that
the universe is very literally a computer and that it is being
used by someone, or something, to solve a problem."
kurt
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Kurt Thearling thearlin%vdsvax.tcpip@ge-crd.arpa
General Electric CRD thearlin@vdsvax.steinmetz.ge.com
Bldg. KW, Room C313 uunet!steinmetz!vdsvax!thearlin
P.O. Box 8 thearlin%vdsvax@steinmetx.uucp
Schenectady, NY 12301 kurt%bach@uxc.cso.uiuc.edu
(518) 387-7219 kurt@bach.csg.uiuc.edu
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 22 Jun 88 12:59:34 EDT
From: "Bruce E. Nevin" <bnevin@cch.bbn.com>
Subject: the legal rights of robots
There is an article entitled `The Rights of Robots' by Phil McNally and
Sohail Inayatullah in the Summer 1988 issue of _Whole Earth Review_.
They work for the Hawaii Judiciary (inter alia). A more complete
legalese version was submitted as a report to the Hawaii Supreme
Court. A footnote to the article says you can obtain this report
and related correspondence from the authors at PO Box 2650, Honolulu,
HI 96804.
The same issue has an article by Candace Pert of NIH about neuropeptides
and the `physical basis of emotions'. This article suggests to me that
the computer may be inappropriate as a metaphor for mental process,
perhaps as inappropriate as the steam engine metaphor that Freud's
thinking was grounded in. (Freud's libido, channelling, repression,
release, all presumed passive neurons as pipes and valves, no
metabolism: the neurophysiological wisdom of the day.)
Bruce Nevin
bn@cch.bbn.com
<usual_disclaimer>
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 23 Jun 88 16:52 EST
From: DJS%UTRC%utrcgw.utc.com@RELAY.CS.NET
Subject: possible value of AI
Gilbert Cockton writes:
"... Once again, what the hell can a computer program tell us about
ourselves? Secondly, what can it tell us that we couldn't find out by
studying people instead?"
What do people use mirrors for? What the hell can a MIRROR tell us about
ourselves? Secondly, what can it tell us that we couldn't find out by
studying people instead?
Isn't it possible that a computer program could have properties
which might facilitate detailed self analysis? I believe some people
have already seen the dim reflection of true intelligence in the primitive
attempts of AI research. Hopefully all that is needed is extensive
polishing and the development of new tools.
David Sirag
UTRC
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 24 Jun 88 18:46 O
From: <YLIKOSKI%FINFUN.BITNET@MITVMA.MIT.EDU>
Subject: metaepistemology
Distribution-File:
AILIST@AI.AI.MIT.EDU
JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU
In AIList Digest V7 #41, John McCarthy <JMC@SAIL.Stanford.EDU>
writes:
>I want to defend the extreme point of view that it is both
>meaningful and possible that the basic structure of the
>world is unknowable. It is also possible that it is
>knowable.
Suppose an agent which wants to know what there is there.
Let the agent have methods and data like a Zetalisp flavor.
Let it have sensors with which it can observe its environment and
methods to influence its environment like servo motors running robot
hands.
Now what can it know?
It is obvious the agent only can have a representation of the Ding an
Sich. In this sense the reality is unknowable. We only have
descriptions of the actual world.
There can be successively better approximations of truth. It is
important to be able to improve the descriptions, compare them and to
be able to discard ones which do not appear to rescribe the reality.
It also helps if the agent itself knows it has descriptions and that
they are mere descriptions.
It also is important to be able to do inferences based on the
descriptions, for example to design an experiment to test a new theory
and compare the predicted outcome with the one which actually takes
place.
It seems that for the most part evolution has been responsible for
developing life-forms which have good descriptions of the Ding an Sich
and which have a good capability to do inference with their models.
Humans are the top of this evolutionary development: we are capable of
forming, processing and communicating complicated symbolic models of
the reality.
Andy Ylikoski
------------------------------
Date: Sat, 25 Jun 88 09:26:02 PDT
From: Stephen Smoliar <smoliar@vaxa.isi.edu>
Subject: H. G. Wells
I was disappointed to see no reaction to John Cugini's quotation from
H. G. Wells. Is no one willing to admit that things haven't changed
since 1906?
------------------------------
Date: Wed Jun 22 13:46:40 EDT 1988
From: sas@BBN.COM
Subject: Smoliar's metaphor
In Volume 7, Issue 41, Stephen Smoliar presents an interesting
metaphor, relating the components of a knowledge representation system
to the parts of speech. In particular he described ACTIONS as verbs
and TYPES as nouns. INSTANCES were merely described as "entities". I
was wondering if it might work better to describe TYPES as
"adjectives" and INSTANCES as "nouns"? If nothing else, it kind of
makes one think.
Just wondering,
Seth
------------------------------
Date: Sat, 25 Jun 88 09:21:39 PDT
From: Stephen Smoliar <smoliar@vaxa.isi.edu>
Subject: more on dance notation
I accept most of John Nagle's response to my remarks on dance notation.
However, I think we both overlooked one area in which, to the best of my
knowledge, NO dance or music notation has served as an effective medium
of communication: This is the matter of how the dancers (or moving agents)
are situated in space and how they interact. Most notations, including
Labanotation, make use of relatively primitive floor plans with little
more than vague attempts to coordinate the notations of individual
movements with paths on those floor plans. In addition, Labanotation
has a repertoire of signs concerned with person-to-person contact; but
these signs lack the rigor which went into the development of the notation
of movement of the limbs and torso.
The original discussion was provoked by the question of what could not be
communicated by a formal system, such as mathematics. From there we progressed
to physical movement as a candidate. That was what led the discussion into
dance notation. However, whatever has been achieved regarding the movement
of an individual has not served the problems with communicating the
interactions of several moving individuals. I would stipulate that
this is still a thorny problem which, in practice, is still handled
basically by demonstration and imitation.
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End of AIList Digest
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