On 10/12/07, Mike Tintner <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > Ben, > > No. Everything is grounded. This is a huge subject. Perhaps you should > read: > > Where Mathematics Comes From, written by George Lakoff and Rafael Nunez, > > You really do need to know about Lakoff/Fauconnier/Mark Johnson/Mark > Turner. > > Especially: > The Body in the Mind. Mark Johnson > The Way We Think - Fauconnier/Turner. >
Mike, sorry to disappoint you, but I have read all those books some time ago. I agree of course that much of math is grounded in sensorimotor reality as Lakoff and Nunez argue, but I also feel they overstate the case by selectively choosing examples.... Anyway, Novamente is flexible enough that we can use it to test empirically whether their theory is true or not. I.e., once an embodied NM system gets smart enough to learn math, we can then study what happens in its mind when it does abstract math like abstract algebra or inaccessible cardinal theory, and see how much sensorimotor grounding it actually uses in carrying out this sort of reasoning ;-) the NM design is not dependent on any theory about how much sensorimotor grounding is needed for any given task. It can flexibly link sensorimotor data with abstractions, insofar as it finds this useful for achieving its goals... -- Ben G ----- This list is sponsored by AGIRI: http://www.agiri.org/email To unsubscribe or change your options, please go to: http://v2.listbox.com/member/?member_id=8660244&id_secret=52859685-8dcf61
