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From: marty1@houdi.UUCP (M.BRILLIANT)
Newsgroups: comp.ai,comp.cog-eng
Subject: Re: The symbol grounding problem
Message-ID: <1172@houdi.UUCP>
Date: Sun, 21-Jun-87 18:55:09 EDT
Article-I.D.: houdi.1172
Posted: Sun Jun 21 18:55:09 1987
Date-Received: Fri, 26-Jun-87 05:04:18 EDT
References: <764@mind.UUCP> <768@mind.UUCP> <770@mind.UUCP> <6174@diamond.BBN.COM> <6670@diamond.BBN.COM>
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories, Holmdel
Lines: 37
Summary: How to define a chair in sensory terms.
Xref: mnetor comp.ai:569 comp.cog-eng:145

In article <6670@diamond.BBN.COM>, aweinste@Diamond.BBN.COM (Anders
Weinstein) writes, with reference to article <861@mind.UUCP>
harnad@mind.UUCP (Stevan Harnad):
> 
> Some of the things you say also suggest that you're attempting to resuscitate
> a form of classical empricist sensory atomism, where the "atomic" symbols
> refer to sensory categories acquired "by acquaintance" and the meaning of
> complex symbols is built up from the atoms "by description". This approach
> has an honorable history in philsophy; unfortunately, no one has ever been
> able to make it work. In addition to the above considerations, the main
> problems seem to be: first, that no principled distinction can be made
> between the simple sensory concepts and the complex "theoretical" ones; and
> second, that very little that is interesting can be explicitly defined in
> sensory terms (try, for example, "chair").
> 
I hope none of us are really trying to resuscitate classical philosophies,
because the object of this discussion is to learn how to use modern
technologies.  To define an interesting object in sensory terms requires
an intermediary module between the sensory system and the symbolic system.

With a chair in the visual sensory field, the system will use hard-coded
nonlinear (decision-making) techniques to identify boundaries and shapes
of objects, and identify the properties that are invariant to rotation
and translation.  A plain wooden chair and an overstuffed chair will be
different objects in these terms.  But the system might also learn to
identify certain types of objects that move, i.e., those we call people.
If it notices that people assume the same position in association with
both chair-objects, it could decide to use the same category for both.

The key to this kind of classification is that the chair is not defined in
explicit sensory terms but in terms of filtered sensory input.

M. B. Brilliant					Marty
AT&T-BL HO 3D-520	(201)-949-1858
Holmdel, NJ 07733	ihnp4!houdi!marty1

P.S. Sorry for the double posting of my previous article.