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Article 2412 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: harwood@umiacs.umd.edu (David Harwood)
Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy
Subject: Re: Are we scaled-up slug-brains or not? (was "In the news...")
Message-ID: <45459@mimsy.umd.edu>
Date: 27 Dec 91 01:17:55 GMT
References: <45328@mimsy.umd.edu> <1991Dec22.010502.26831@news.media.mit.edu> <45452@mimsy.umd.edu>
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Organization: UMIACS, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742
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In article <45452@mimsy.umd.edu> kohout@cs.umd.edu (Robert Kohout) writes:
(...)
>fact that funding for neural net research dried up after the
>publication of Perceptrons may be largely coincidental, and I certainly
>don't believe that it was completely due to the influence of the
>book. On the other hand, I have yet to hear anyone but Minsky
>and Papert assert that it had no influence whatsoever.
>
>I am also somewhat at a loss as Minsky's specific objection. 
>Does he actually consider himself the godfather of Perceptrons?
>
\\\\\\\\\\\
	As far as I can tell, things are over- or under- funded
for all sorts of unwarranted reasons; most of us can agree on that,
perhaps.
	I was the guilty party who referred to the newspaper
article reporting an artificial "neuron" and to Minsky as
"the godfather of Perceptrons" - I regret to having attached
his name to our discussion.
	My point was simply that some 'experts' think we have
a long way to go before we understand the neurophysiology under-
lying human intelligence, presumably. The newspaper quote may
well have been wrong - we should read Minsky's publications
in any case to know his views. My reference to him as "godfather"
was rhetorical.
D.H.


