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From: goldfain@osiris.cso.uiuc.edu
Newsgroups: comp.ai
Subject: Re: Neural Networks - Pointers to good
Message-ID: <8300006@osiris.cso.uiuc.edu>
Date: Mon, 19-Oct-87 03:27:00 EDT
Article-I.D.: osiris.8300006
Posted: Mon Oct 19 03:27:00 1987
Date-Received: Wed, 21-Oct-87 19:37:23 EDT
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Nf-From: osiris.cso.uiuc.edu!goldfain    Oct 19 02:27:00 1987


I agree with the respondent whose user-name was listed as "smoliar" that this
haggling about earliest references is "silly".  In fact, I don't understand
the need for any territorial fight over terminology here.

     Do physiologists actually use the two-word term "neural network" in their
literature?  "Neuron",  and "neural tissue",  surely, but do they actually use
"neural network" ?  If not, then  there  is no ambiguity.   Sure there is some
danger of confusion, but no  more  than I think is usual  in cases of "learned
borrowing".   The term "neural    network" as  used     by  "connectionist/AI"
researchers caught on precisely because this model of  computation is based on
the gross behavior of real, mammalian-brain neurons.  It can be viewed in some
ways as a study of the human brain itself.  Thus it is  no greater an abuse of
terminology than, for example, "pipeline computers".

     On the other hand, whatever became of the term "cybernetics" that Norbert
Weiner coined long   ago?   I  thought  its definition was quite  suitable for
denoting this research.  I doubt that "connectionist" is much help, in view of
the fact that the "connection machine" is more a project in pure parallelism
than intended as a neural model.

If I am wrong about any of this, please enlighten me.