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From: jeff@aiai.ed.ac.uk (Jeff Dalton)
Newsgroups: comp.ai,sci.philosophy.tech
Subject: Re: Thought and Utility
Keywords: decision intention reality metaphor
Message-ID: <1553@skye.ed.ac.uk>
Date: 15 Jan 90 17:39:54 GMT
References: <31821@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu> <0cTG02uf793w01@amdahl.uts.amdahl.com> <984@metapsy.UUCP>
Reply-To: jeff@aiai.UUCP (Jeff Dalton)
Organization: AIAI, University of Edinburgh, Scotland
Lines: 19

In article <984@metapsy.UUCP> sarge@metapsy.UUCP (Sarge Gerbode) writes:
  I would agree that the ability to decide (which implies the ability
  to *intend*) is crucial to the process of understanding.  But
  intending (or deciding) requires a conscious being.  It is not enough
  to say that given condition A, result A' obtains, whereas given
  condition B, result B' obtains.  The same could be said of an eroded
  hillside:  When it rains, you get mudslides;  when it doesn't rain,
  you get cracks.  That doesn't mean the hillside is *deciding*
  anything.  It behaves that way because that is the physics of the
  situation.  The same is true of a computer, except that what occurs
  with a computer is simpler and more predictable.

That's a good point, but I think we have to allow for the possibility
that we behave as we do because of the physics of the situation too.
Dennett's book _Elbow Room_ is worth reading on this point.  However,
that wouldn't mean intending had to occur at every level, so your
point would still be valid.

-- Jeff