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From: bwk@mbunix.mitre.org (Barry W. Kort)
Newsgroups: comp.ai,talk.religion.misc
Subject: Re: Elementary AI Philosophy
Summary: Only the elite may read this posting.
Keywords: Understanding and Comprehension, Reality and Modeling
Message-ID: <44077@linus.UUCP>
Date: 29 Jan 89 01:27:36 GMT
References: <18464@santra.UUCP> <1241@arctic.nprdc.arpa> <904@ubu.warwick.UUCP> <9423@ihlpb.ATT.COM> <43763@linus.UUCP> <9465@ihlpb.ATT.COM>
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In article <9465@ihlpb.ATT.COM> arm@ihlpb.UUCP (55528-Macalalad,A.R.)
publishes a somewhat extended discussion in lieu of bounced E-mail.
I hope that the netters won't find our open dialogue too offensive.

Starting with Alex's concluding paragraphs:

 > Barry, I have long admired your thoughtful and thought-provoking
 > discussion on the net.  Please let me know if I have completely
 > missed your point (which is very possible).

Thank you, Alex.  I appreciate your kind remarks.  I don't think
you missed my point, but perhaps you missed my intent.

 > My point was to argue that Searle's man inside the computer was
 > essentially a homunculus.   ...  Finally, since most of us agree
 > that none of us need a little man inside our head in order to
 > understand, Searle's assumption that a computer _does_ can
 > easily be seen as fallacious.

I completely agree, Alex.  I was hoping to go beyond your refutation
of Searle, and suggest a plausible mechanism for understanding
that illustrates the process without any need for a homunculus.

 > As to my comment that the computer system as a whole understands,
 > I meant that understanding was an emergent property of the
 > computer system.

Yes.  I, too, am persuaded by the "emergent property" argument.

Returning now to the details of my original comments,

>In article <43763@linus.UUCP> Barry Kort writes:
>>There *can* be "something inside the computer that `understands'",
>>but that something need not be thought of as a "homunculus".
>>
>> [Deleted discussion of computer-resident models.]
>
>Barry, I'm not sure what this has to do with homunculi.  Who is
>doing the comprehending here, the model or you?  If I build a model
>railroad, does the model railroad then have some comprehension of
>railroads?

It has nothing to do with homunculi.  There is no "who", unless
you want to think of the computer as an "amplifier of the mind",
in which case the computer and I together form the "who".  The
computer reposes the model on my behalf.  (It may be sapient,
but it is not yet sentient, conscious, or the slightest
bit interested in my model.)

>If what you're trying to say is that you construct the computer system
>such that it builds its own models of reality, then I would answer
>that the computer system as a whole, and not its models, is
>comprehending.

I would agree with that.  But you must know that my computer is
not so advanced.  I have to laboriously teach it everything it knows.
Maybe someday I'll get my hands on a more powerful computer, but
for now I'm stuck with garden variety low-budget models.

>>As to intelligence, that step follows easily after I have a working
>>model.  I can now do "thought experiments" on the model to find
>>out what will happen if I diddle the controls on the model, or
>>if I perturb the operating environment in which the model is
>>embedded.  I call this "cognition".  (Some people call it
>>model-based reasoning, or modal logic.)
>
>Most people call it the scientific method. (:-)  Again, where does
>the cognition lie, in you or the model?

Yeah, I was hoping to sneak the name of that step past my critics
who don't want to admit that they are unclear on the scientific
method.  Anyway, the cognition is a joint effort, but the computer
does most of the dirty work.  (I'm not only sneaky, I'm lazy to boot.)

>>[Defintion of "phenomenal" as "to capture with the senses,"
>>and "noumenal", as "to capture with thought." 
>
>As I understand it, noumenal refers to the thing-in-itself, as
>opposed to phenomenal, which refers to the thing-perceived.  Kant
>argued that the noumena is unknowable through rational thought, i.e.
>we can learn only about things as they are perceived, and nothing
>about things-in-themselves.  If by saying that theories are the
>product of noumenal thought, you imply that I can never fully
>understand your theory, then you may be right. (:-)

Kant did take a perfectly meaningful word ("noumenal"), and
elaborate it as you have outlined.  Personally, I don't
understand Kant's distinction.  I was using the word in
its more primitive denotation as that which is perceived by
insight.  My favorite metaphor is that of the jigsaw puzzle
whose big picture is assembled in one's head instead of by
laboriously hand-assembly for the benefit of the regular
visual system.  (For very small jigsaw puzzles, anyone can do this.)

As to understanding someone else's theory, I think it not
impossible.  But I am reminded of Raymond Smullyan's whimsical
Professor Griffin, curator of the Master Forest in _To Mock
A Mockingbird_.  Griffin's rule is that only the elite are
permitted to enter his forest.  But the kindly professor
has a liberal definition of "elite".  He defines elite as
anyone who wishes to enter.

--Barry Kort