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From: marcel@uiucdcs.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.ai
Subject: Re: just a reminder... - (nf)
Message-ID: <4350@uiucdcs.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 6-Dec-83 04:25:57 EST
Article-I.D.: uiucdcs.4350
Posted: Tue Dec  6 04:25:57 1983
Date-Received: Fri, 9-Dec-83 01:17:11 EST
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#R:sri-arpa:-1364800:uiucdcs:32300011:000:1205
uiucdcs!marcel    Dec  5 20:00:00 1983

And furthermore ... if the lower and middle ranks of the medical profession
are more humane, why not give them some help with the knowledge reserved for
the upper ranks? They'd be better equipped to stay humane AND be more helpful.
Less people would need MD's.

A related question is whether medical systems will replace any of the MD
functions, and if so which? Diagnosis yes, but the machine will have to rely
on human observations/measurements for a while yet. Surgery no, not for a
very long time. Dispensing prescriptions is ok, and that's all that quite
a few people need. Except for those who keep coming back for more because
they need to be listened to ... they need help of a less physiological kind.

A point I concede to Dietz@usc-ecla (re my first response) is that economic
expert systems will not, of themselves, be much use. You can't have an expert
system without an expert (at least not yet) and if the experts do exist it
won't take very many of them to plan ahead for our economy. There is work
now in progress, however, that promises eventually to be able to organize 
knowledge better than humans can, and at least we can be trying to apply
THAT to economics.

					Marcel Schoppers