joefromchicago wrote:That, however, ignores the fact that, if the only thing that anyone can see is the inside of their own bag, it follows that the only thing that Maturana can describe is the inside of his own bag. So any description of bags in general would be drawn not from an observation of everyone else's bags, but rather from a minute investigation of his own.
A question I have pondered (and is a common theme in some SF) is how the apple cart would be upset when Artificial Intelligence arrives in the not-too-distant future.
Especially if it's the type of A.I. that can self-learn, re-learn, re-preprogram, self-program, expand etc. I wonder how easy it will be then to suggest this paper bag analogy with a moving target such as A.I. I've also often felt that the Turing Test has implications beyond A.I. in terms of the subject of this thread, Objective Knowledge.
Wikipedia wrote:The Turing test is a proposal for a test of a machine's capability to demonstrate thought. Described by Professor Alan Turing in the 1950 paper "Computing machinery and intelligence," it proceeds as follows: a human judge engages in a natural language conversation with two other parties, one a human and the other a machine; if the judge cannot reliably tell which is which, then the machine is said to pass the test. It is assumed that both the human and the machine try to appear human. In order to keep the test setting simple and universal (to explicitly test the linguistic capability of the machine instead of its ability to render words into audio), the conversation is usually limited to a text-only channel such as a teletype machine as Turing suggested or, more recently, IRC or instant messaging.
Joe,
I don't want to engage in "last wordism" so I will simply say this. Maturana attempts to attain a non-anthropocentric position. You and I can easily pick holes in such an attempt,(I have stated my own reservations) but the driving force therein has had a demonstrable influence on current views of epistemology. You can deny this for yourself if you wish, though I suspect if you are honest, it has had some effect. I do however acknowledge your concession to dip your feet in such waters even if you do tend to keep your rhetorical boots on.
Chumly,
You might enjoy "The Cambridge Quintet" by John Casti which is a fictional account of a dinner party involving Turing, Wittgenstein and others with AI as the central topic of heated dispute. (My thanks to JLN for bringing this to my attention).
Sounds like a fun book thanks for the suggestion!
Chumly wrote:Especially if it's the type of A.I. that can self-learn, re-learn, re-preprogram, self-program, expand etc. I wonder how easy it will be then to suggest this paper bag analogy with a moving target such as A.I. I've also often felt that the Turing Test has implications beyond A.I. in terms of the subject of this thread, Objective Knowledge.
Wikipedia wrote:The Turing test is a proposal for a test of a machine's capability to demonstrate thought. Described by Professor Alan Turing in the 1950 paper "Computing machinery and intelligence," it proceeds as follows: a human judge engages in a natural language conversation with two other parties, one a human and the other a machine; if the judge cannot reliably tell which is which, then the machine is said to pass the test. It is assumed that both the human and the machine try to appear human. In order to keep the test setting simple and universal (to explicitly test the linguistic capability of the machine instead of its ability to render words into audio), the conversation is usually limited to a text-only channel such as a teletype machine as Turing suggested or, more recently, IRC or instant messaging.
Maybe the Turing test could simply be, any machine capable of interacting on a forum such as A2K without being recognized as a machine, should be considered AI.
Maybe they are already here.
rosborne, We already have AI that we use and "communicate" with all the time on the telephone. I just registered my "new" AT&T cellphone, and the "girl" I talked to was a machine. This kind of "service" is going to become more common in the future, and in the not distant future, we're going to be able to see the "woman" we talk to on the telephone by two-way cameras. AI is here.
cicerone imposter wrote:rosborne, We already have AI that we use and "communicate" with all the time on the telephone. I just registered my "new" AT&T cellphone, and the "girl" I talked to was a machine. This kind of "service" is going to become more common in the future, and in the not distant future, we're going to be able to see the "woman" we talk to on the telephone by two-way cameras. AI is here.
Not the kind of AI I'm talking about.
I'd like to repeat myself here: the polar distinctions, objectivism vs. subjectivism, absolute vs relative, mind vs brain, idealism vs materialism, etc. are all unities. Each pole makes no sense without the other, but we seem to have to take one side to the exclusion of the other. Yin defines yang and vice versa. Too bad we can't use such contrast sets as they are and transcend much of our bickering. In the social sciences "functionalism" was consistently opposed to "structuralism" and vice versa, few thinkers realized that functions are what structures do, and structures are, in large part, the embodiments of functions.
rosborne979 wrote:Maybe they are already here.
That thought always puts a grin on my face (that is assuming you believe I have a face).
fresco wrote:Joe,
I don't want to engage in "last wordism" so I will simply say this. Maturana attempts to attain a non-anthropocentric position. You and I can easily pick holes in such an attempt,(I have stated my own reservations) but the driving force therein has had a demonstrable influence on current views of epistemology. You can deny this for yourself if you wish, though I suspect if you are honest, it has had some effect. I do however acknowledge your concession to dip your feet in such waters even if you do tend to keep your rhetorical boots on.
Maturana is very interesting. Very wrong, of course, but very interesting nonetheless. A sort of "Foucault-lite."
I am glad people are giving reading suggestions. Descartes was my first intoduction to epistemology. I tried to read Kant but understood only a little. Karl Popper was good at explaining Kant. Of course, I have read a lot of Popper's essays which were based on the lectures he gave. I would have loved to have Popper as a professor. There are many that I should read but have not (Wittgenstein, Carnap, Tarski, Quine). I also read Thomas Kuhn but I consider him to be more of a historian.
The probability approach to truth was expressed by A. J. Ayer in
Language, Truth, and Logic:
Quote:What is the criterion by which we test the validity of an empirical proposition? The answer is that we test the validity of an empirical hypothesis by seeing whether it actually fulfils the function which it was designed to fulfil. And we have seen that the function of an empirical hypothesis is to enable us to anticipate experience. Accordingly, if an observation to which a given proposition is relevant conforms to our expectations, the truth of that proposition is confirmed. One cannot say that the proposition has been proved absolutely valid, because it is still possible that a future observation will discredit it. But one can say that its probability has been increased.
Fresco, you note that "Maturana attempts to attain a non-anthropocentric position". I wish him luck in such an attempt but one of my admittedly fallible personal dogmas is the principle that we are epistemologically anthropomorphic to the core. Knowlege is a function of the knower, ultimately a form of behavior.
Even the efforts of the quantum theorists of modern physics amount to attempts at incorporating the most esoteric phenomena within the range of our conceptual spheres, be they mathematical or linguistic.
We are little more than translators of the foreign into the familiar
JLN,
Maturana follows Piaget's lead in looking for "biological substrates" on which to base epistemology. For him "cognition" is a process exhibited by "all life" (as was "intelligence for Piaget..."life" also applying to social structures and beyond). "Language" which might be seen by some as a unique property of human "cognition" is relegated by him to the ranks of "organization of action potential".
The key to communing with Maturana is understanding his concept of "structure" which has both material and non material aspects. I have a few problems with this but not from the anthropocentric point of view. My problem is more to do with the possible circularity of "life structures" recognizing "life structures". (Apologies if that is cryptic....shades of "what is order/disorder)
Since structures are "nested" in this system (cell/organ/person/group etc)
so is "knowledge" and "observer"...hence the concept of "observer domains" at different levels of nesting.
Yes, from that perspective can the Cosmos be considered a system of perhaps infintely (or indefinetely) nested structures (taking structures as finite patterns of processes)?
And is Maturana's "organization of action potential" synomymous with thoughts that effectively guide action? To me an "organization of action potential" might include effective maps or recipes that help me to get where I want to be.
BTW, doesn't "biological substrate of epistemology" sound profoundly anthropomorphic, i.e., that our forms of understanding are rooted in our very nature, that knowledge of a function of the knower, etc.?
From the perspective of mystical enlightenment, to know one's true nature is to know something central about the Cosmos.
