Scott Brown wrote:
Hi Richard,
On Dec 6, 2007 8:46 AM, Richard Loosemore <[EMAIL PROTECTED]
<mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]>> wrote:
Try to think of some other example where we have tried to build a system
that behaves in a certain overall way, but we started out by using
components that interacted in a completely funky way, and we succeeded
in getting the thing working in the way we set out to. In all the
history of engineering there has never been such a thing.
I would argue that, just as we don't have to fully understand the
complexity posed by the interaction of subatomic particles to make
predictions about the way molecular systems behave, we don't have to
fully understand the complexity of interactions between neurons to make
predictions about how cognitive systems behave. Many researchers are
attempting to create cognitive models that don't necessarily map
directly back to low-level neural activity in biological organisms.
Doesn't this approach mitigate some of the risk posed by complexity in
neural systems?
I completely agree that the neural-level stuff does not have to impact
cognitive-level stuff: that is why I work at the cognitive level and do
not bother too much with exact neural architecture.
The only problem with your statement was the last sentence: when I say
that there is a complex systems problem, I only mean complexity at the
cognitive level, not complexity at the neural level.
I am not too worried about any complexity that might exist down at the
neural level because as far as I can tell that level is not *dominated*
by complex effects. At the cognitive level, on the other hand, there is
a strong possibility that what happens when the mind builds a model of
some situation, it gets a large nummber of concepts to come together and
try to relax into a stable representation, and that relaxation process
is potentially sensitive to complex effects (some small parameter in the
design of the "concepts" could play a crucial role in ensuring that the
relaxation process goes properly, for example).
I am being rather terse here due to lack of time, but that is the short
answer.
Richard Loosemore
-----
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=73430502-7926e9
