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From: stevens@prodigal.psych.rochester.edu (Greg Stevens)
Subject: Re: Greg Stevens Re: THE BRAIN AND THE BIRTHRIGHT OF A CHILD
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Date: Thu, 29 Dec 94 16:41:46 GMT
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<3dumib$1t7@ixnews2.ix.netcom.com> roose@ix.netcom.com (Richard Roose) writes:
>In <1994Dec29.014458.28588@galileo.cc.rochester.edu> 
>stevens@prodigal.psych.rochester.edu (Greg Stevens) writes: 

[PROPOSED OUTLINE OF ISSUES TO COVER:]

>>If he addresses his assertion that there is a consensus about 
>>definition of  intelligence when I believe there is none

>>and his assertion that there is a consensus on how intelligence is 
>>produced by the brain when I believe there is none, 

>>and if he addresses how his jump from developmental neurology to 
>>teleology and "birthrights" is logically justified, 

>>and if he justifies his claim that connectionism is accepted as the 
>>method of  modelling most likely to lead an understanding of 
>>intelligence...

>>and if he addresses how he arrived at his "fundamental" list of human 
>>goals and motives. 

I agree with this basic outline.

>However, I would suggest that we carry it somewhat further to some 
>conclusions about "what" and "how" is going on in a human mind both 
>during the development period between birth and 5/6 years of age, and in 
>the adult mind.

Okay.

>I offer what I 
>believe are accepted facts about the human brain.

>1) The human brain is responsible for what we term cognition, i.e. brain 
>and mind are essentially synonymous terms.

Not meaning to nitpick, but saying the brain is responsible for cognition
does not make "brain" and "mind" synonymous any more than "sunlight" and
"the sun" are synonymous.

>2) At birth the brain of a human infant contains more neurons than it 
>will contain when it reaches adulthood.

Sure. [in future, if I do not put a comment after a point, that means I 
accept it]

>3) At birth the dendrites of the brain of a human infant are sparse and 
>relatively unconnected between neurons.

>4) During the first year of life a human infant's brain doubles in size 
>due to the growth and interconnection of dendrite tissue.

>5) By the 5/6 year of development the human infant's brain achieves 80% 
>to 90% of its adult weight primarily through the growth and 
>interconnection of dendrites; and the coating of the neurons with 
>myelin.

>6) The human brain is divided into three primary functional areas which 
>are the "r-complex or reptilian brain" which is primarily responsible 
>for the automatic internal functions of the body, the "limbic system" 
>which primarily functions to generate the physical/hormonal aspects of 
>human emotion, and the "cortex" which is responsible for all higher or 
>"cognitive" aspects of the brain. 

Although I personally agree with this, I don't think many neurophysiologists
would be ready to accept this modular view COMPELTELY.  Many aspects of
emotion seem to be dealt with systemically outside the limbic structures,
for example.

>7) The cortex accounts for approximately 70% of an adult's brain tissue.

>8) Human "personality" and human "intelligence" are two entirely 
>separate aspects of the human brain.  Human personality is not the topic 
>of this debate.

IF, as clinicians claim, personality is somewhat dependent upon experience,
AND, "dependent upon experience" implies dependent upon memory,
AND, memory is a function primarily active in the cortex,
AND the cortex is responsible for cognition,

THEN, personality is dependent upon cognition and the two are not totally
seperable.

[ADRESSING OF POINT IN THE LIST ABOVE]

>First... "If he addresses his assertion that there is a consensus about 
>definition of  intelligence when I believe there is none."

Okay, so I misunderstood your motive -- I though your goal was to educate
about the state of scientific understanding today, but it seems you goal
was to educate about your views and your understanding of intelligence.

>Intelligence is...

>"The ability of the brain to visualize the future and construct plans 
>and options for shaping the future to its will."

I remember seeing this definition.  It strikes me, however, that one of the
main functions of cennectionist networks is catagorization, dimensionality
reduction and association, none of which have been (explicitly, anyway)
mentioned in your view of intelligence.

> ...These functions 
>include sensing, thought, memory, visualization and correlation.   We 
>can lump all these functions together under the term of  "reasoning" 
>(one word fairly accurately defined in my dictionary).   There is one 
>more function of the brain which allows for human "action" and that is 
>"body control". 

According to rational choice theory, a large part of reasoning is not
only prediction but attaching valuative judgements to expected outcomes.
Are you familiar with this literature? I think you would be itnerested in
it if you are not. 

>Will you accept this definition of intellengence as a baseline for a 
>discussion of intelligence? 

For the purposes of this debate, I will accept this definition and let 
anyone who wants to debate that point with you.  Now that I see more clearly
that your goal is to propose your view in language peopel can understand,
rather than explain what the scientific community at large believes in 
language people can understand, the fact that I tend to agree with you
matters more in the context of the debate than the fact that many people
within the scientific community disagree

However, while I will accept your definition for now, I want you to be aware
that I still am not totally secure in saying, "This is the view I beleive,"
while --

1) A lot of human reasoning seems to occur in "predicate logic" format,
   which is not a function within purely associative constructs (traditional
   connectionist networks)
2) Limbic structures are generally not modelled by neural networks (they
   tend to focus on generalizing from the function of the cortex), and yet
   they play a very strong role, as you have indicated, in learning and
   the directing (through emotions) of behavior and attension.
3) If intelligence is in fact directed by emotions and limbic structures, it
   seems there is something going on beyond mere "memory, visualization and
   correlation."
4) The other element in your list, "thought," you haven't defined.  When an
   amoeba in a petri dish with a glucose source moves towards the glucose
   source, has it had a thought?  Some people think that thermostats can
   have three thoughts -- "it's too cold" "it's too warm" and "it's just right"
   but I'm not sure you'd agree with this view.  I'm not sure I wouldn't.
  
>Second... "and his assertion that there is a consensus on how 
>intelligence is produced by the brain when I believe there is none."

I'm cutting the beginning of the quote to start it with the claim that
"it is not accepted."

> ...  It is now accepted that 
>the basis of the human mind is the neural network concept.  For the 
>layman who is interested in the theory of neural networks, I would 
>suggest "Neural Computing, Theory and Practice" by Phillip D. Wasserman 
>(Van Nostrand Reinhold, 1989).

>You will note that this is not a claim of any wide "consensus", or even 
>of "any" consensus concerning how the brain operates.  What the sentence 
>says is that the neural network is "accepted" as a model for human 
>cognition.  I believe this is an accurate statement.  The neural network 
>concept may in fact not be "universally" accepted as the model, but I 
>believe it is "widely" accepted as a good model.  

Okay, this depends on how one parses "it is not accepted."  Here I think you
could do well to disambiguate your language.  Many people will interpret
"it is now accepted" to mean "everyone now accepts."  These are the
treacheries of passive voice construction. :-)

>One of my favorite books on the subject of mind development is "Your 
>Child's Growing Mind" by Jane M. Healy, Ph.D. (1987, Doubleday & 
>Company).  

I'm familiar with Healy's work.

>Although I did not claim consensus, until your post I was not aware of 
>any lack of consensus concerning the neural network model.  I have never 
>read a single word refuting the model as the basis of human 
>intelligence. 

Check out Seidenberg, M.S.  1993.  "Connectionist Models and Cognitive
Theory," Psychological Science, 4:228-235, for a list of references
about the ongoing debate for and against connectionist models in
psychology and philosophy of science.

One of the biggest arguments against is the lack of structure to connectionist
processing -- connectionist models are statistics machines, they do 
dimensionality reductions, curve fitting, all kinds of thing.  But if you
beleive that human thought is propositional or functions according to
some predicate calculus, as MANY philsophers of mind do, neural nets by
themselves don't cut it.


Greg Stevens

stevens@prodigal.psych.rochester.edu

