2008/5/5 Richard Loosemore <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>: > "The goal of symbol grounding is not to guarantee uniqueness but to ensure > that the connection between the symbols and the objects they are > systematically interpretable as being about does not depend exclusively on > an interpretation projected onto the symbols by an interpreter outside the > system." > > The crucial part is to guarantee that the meaning of the symbols does not > depend on interpreter-applied meanings.
Interpretors are constantly superimposing their own meanings onto the raw data they observe. There can be many different interpretations of the same news story, or novel, or painting, or AI conference. The way I prefer to think about it is a continuous process of synchronising predicted models with actual observations, because this encourages the idea of perception and cognition as closed loop systems rather than a tyranny of "bottom up" or "top down". Personally I don't believe that symbols exist independently from subjective interpretation (or a collection of such interpretations commonly used within a society). A spade is only a spade by virtue of the way humans use it and tend to agree that it is the same kind of object, otherwise it's just a peculiar configuration of atoms. Symbols within biological systems are also far more amorphous than their computational counterparts, existing only as groups of synchronously active neurons (coalitions of the willing). ------------------------------------------- agi Archives: http://www.listbox.com/member/archive/303/=now RSS Feed: http://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/303/ Modify Your Subscription: http://www.listbox.com/member/?member_id=8660244&id_secret=101455710-f059c4 Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
