I have to think about this. What appears to me is that while I am very stingy about human consciousness, I am, relative to you. generous about robot awareness.
It feels like I am trying to close a gap that you are trying to open. Nick Nicholas S. Thompson Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology, Clark University ([email protected]) http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/ > [Original Message] > From: glen e. p. ropella <[email protected]> > To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[email protected]> > Date: 6/15/2009 2:20:59 PM > Subject: Re: [FRIAM] consciousness > > Nicholas Thompson emitted this, circa 09-06-15 10:25 AM: > > Let us imagine that we want to program a robot to do stuff .... many of > > you have, I gather. Now, I assume that any robot worth it's salt, will > > have a certain amount of self knowledge. It will know, for instance, > > where it is. It will know the position of its effectors. It may also > > know something about what it has done recently. > > > > So how do roboteers provide their robots with such knowledge.? > > This depends entirely on the robot. Most robots are controlled with a > microcontroller. And in that, they are nothing more than general > purpose computers with sensors attached. But some robots (e.g. BEAM) > are (basically) just coupled oscillators with sensors attached. > > Perhaps there are other types; but these will serve for your question. > For a microcontroller-based robot, the "knowledge" is programmed in by > the programmer. All such knowledge is explicitly grounded by the > programmer to the I/O data for the programs. For example, if the > program is: read magnetic field -> turn motor, then the robot's > "knowledge" is about magnetic fields and motors. > > In contrast, however, for a BEAM robot, what the robot "knows" can be a > bit of a mystery to the roboteer because the oscillators conflate to > create systemic properties that may not have been obvious to (or > amenable to a closed form solution developed by) the roboteer. If it's > simple enough (e.g. builds charge from a solar panel into a capacitor > that eventually discharges), the robot "knows" how to store energy > slowly and expend it rapidly. The knowledge here is implicitly grounded > directly to the sensors and actuators. > > > Obviously, any sophisticated robot will be a hybrid of these two > extremes. So, to answer your question as directly as possible, > roboteers do NOT provide the robots with their "knowledge". The > roboteers construct a machine, that's all. If there is any knowledge in > a robot, it will remain a mystery to the roboteer until the robots are > intelligent enough to report back what they know. [grin] > > -- > glen e. p. ropella, 971-222-9095, http://agent-based-modeling.com > > > ============================================================ > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv > Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College > lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
