Mike Tintner wrote:
Richard: Now, interpreting that result is not easy,
Richard, I get the feeling you're getting understandably tired with all
your correspondence today. Interpreting *any* of the examples of *hard*
cog sci that you give is not easy. They're all useful, stimulating
stuff, but they don't add up to a hard pic. of the brain's cognitive
architecture. Perhaps Ben will back me up on this - it's a rather
important point - our overall *integrated* picture of the brain's
cognitive functioning is really v. poor, although certainly we have a
wealth of details about, say, which part of the brain is somehow
connected to a given operation.
You make an important point, but in your haste to make it you may have
overlooked the fact that I really agree with you ... and have gone on to
say that I am trying to fix that problem.
What I mean by that: if you look at cog psy/cog sci in a superficial
way you might come awy with the strong impression that "they don't add
up to a hard pic. of the brain's cognitive architecture". Sure. But
that is what I meant when I said that "cog sci has a huge amount of
information stashed away, but it is in a format that makes it very hard
for someone trying to build an intelligent system to actually use".
I believe I can see deeper into this problem, and I think that cog sci
can be made to add up to a consistent picture, but it requires an extra
organizational ingredient that I am in the process of adding right now.
The root of the problem is that the cog sci and AI communities both have
extremely rigid protocols about how to do research, which are
incompatible with each other. In cog sci you are expected to produce a
micro-theory for every experimental result, and efforts to work on
larger theories or frameworks without introducing new experimental
results that are directly explained are frowned upon. The result is a
style of work that produces "local patch" theories that do not have any
generality.
The net result of all this is that when you say that "our overall
*integrated* picture of the brain's cognitive functioning is really v.
poor" I would point out that this is only true if you replace the "our"
with "the AI community's".
Richard:I admit that I am confused right
now: in the above paragraphs you say that your position is that the
human mind is 'rational' and then later that it is 'irrational' - was
the first one of those a typo?
Richard, No typo whatsoever if you just reread. V. clear. I say and
said: *scientific pychology* and *cog sci* treat the mind as rational. I
am the weirdo who is saying this is nonsense - the mind is
irrational/crazy/creative - rationality is a major *achievement* not
something that comes naturally. "Mike Tintner= crazy/irrational"-
somehow, I don't think you'll find that hard to remember.
The problem here is that I am not sure in what sense you are using the
word "rational". There are many usages. One of those usages is very
common in cog sci, and if I go with *that* usage your claim is
completely wrong: you can pick up an elementary cog psy textbook and
find at least two chapters dedicated to a discussion about the many ways
that humans are (according to the textbook) "irrational".
I suspect what is happening is that you are using the term in a
different way, and that this is the cause of the confusion. Since you
are making the claim, I think the ball is in your court: please try to
explain why this discrepency arises so I can understand you claim. Take
a look at e.g. Eysenck and Keane (Cognitive Psychology) and try to
reconcile what you say with what they say.
Richard Loosemore
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