We've been discussing how humans recognize that they don't recognize
objects/info. - "don't know" something.
How about how humans categorise in the first place ? How do we decide - to
use another recent thread [see below] - whether *cybersex* classifies as
*sex* or not, or whether *foreplay* and *Clintonian sex* classify as *sex*?
Or whether *anal sex gets you pregnant*? And does that last example belong
to *categorisation* or merely *reasoning*? And whether "The relationship
between cybersex and sex is of a completely different character to the
relationship between penguins and birds" ?
How do we resolve/argue our disagreements about categorisation?
What I''m particularly interested in is whether anyone thinks these matters
can be resolved by purely symbolic, logical reasoning and semantic networks
[with symbolic/verbal definitions of what concepts like *sex* involve] or
any other current computational methods.
My hypothesis is that categorisation depends heavily on the use of
imagination - we have to imagine (albeit often unconsciously) the real
things denoted by the concepts in order to "draw the line" as to what they
do or do not include - visualise sex, for example, (and audiovisualise
"reasoning") - to settle what we think does or does not classify as sex,
and whether *anal sex gets you pregnant*. A very great deal of the time
there are no suitable symbolic/verbal definitions available.
["Dear Alice, Last night, my girlfriend and I had anal sex without a condom.
She is a virgin. Is there a probability for her to get pregnant?.."]
And, of course, if anyone wants to give us what they consider the latest cog
sci/AI positions here, please do.
*******************************************
Benjamin Johnston <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
The relationship between cybersex and sex is of a completely different
character to the relationship between penguins and birds.
Can you define that difference in an abstract, general way? I mean,
what is the *qualitative* difference that makes:
"cybersex is a kind of sex"
different from:
"penguin is a kind of bird"?
You may say: cybersex and phone sex lacks property X that is common
to all other forms of sex. But then, anal sex or sex with a condom do
not get a female pregnant, right? So by a similar reasoning you may
also exclude anal sex or sex with a condom as sex.
It seems that you (perhaps subjectively) require "having physical
contact" as a defining characteristic of sex. But I can imagine
someone not using that criterion in the definition of sex.
Also relevant here is Wittgenstein's idea of "family resemblance":
sometimes you may not be able to list all the defining properties of a
concept.
YKY
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agi
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agi
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