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From: mentifex@scn.org (SCN User)
Subject: Re: Difference between 'I' and 'me'
Message-ID: <E5CFuM.967@scn.org>
Sender: news@scn.org
Organization: Seattle Community Network
Date: Sun, 9 Feb 1997 16:15:57 GMT
Lines: 80


>On WED.29JAN.1997, Luka Crnkovic (devalmont@geocities.com> queried:
>
>> I am currently writing a program that processes nat-lang. and I
>> have a problem. At one stage of my program I would like to reverse
>> the pronouns so that you becomes 'I', 'your' becomes 'my' and so on.
>> The actual problem is in the conversion of the word 'you'
>> - it can be translated as both 'me' and 'I'.
>
>In October 1994 this same problem arose in the development of the
>public-domain (Amiga-only) Mind.rexx program of Project Mentifex.


Am 9. Oktober 1994, Sonntag in der Corliss-Strasse.  At Vaierre I
have been trying to figure out the triple-depth mind.  When I fi-
nally thought that I understood it,  I was able  to rise and come
hither.
   Although I have not settled finally on particular names, let's
say that the inmost concepts "deep.f" interact with the intermedi-
ate concepts "fiber.n", which in turn activate the "ph.t" audito-
ry engrams.
   Let's imagine  that a nascent mind  forms  two primordial con-
cepts, "self" and "other."
   Now let's discuss  an advanced mind  that hears  the sentence,
"You eat fish."
   As I lay thinking at Vaierre today,  I examined the difference
between uttering the word "you" and hearing the word "you."   Af-
ter much thought,  interspersed with falling asleep several times
and even dreaming,  I came to the conclusion  that the difference
will consist chiefly  in the activation of reference-flags within
the flag-panels of the  fiber.n  concepts.  There will be perhaps
an "endo" (Greek for "interior") flag  within the  fiber.n  flag-
panel to direct the activation of deep concepts when the interme-
diate fiber.n concepts are activated.
   Some of my reasoning follows.
   The first deep concept,  that of "self,"  probably arises when
the  mental  organism  first feels anything with the senses.   An
"ego" senses  something,  and therefore "ego" becomes  a concept.
That is to say, an initial "ego" concept-fiber becomes active.
   Immediately a  second  concept becomes active, a vague, undif-
ferentiated notion of the non-self "other" that the mind senses.
   This massively unknown "other" will gradually  be differentia-
ted into multifarious ontology,  in a process  whereby conceptual
aggregates join and divide and move and scatter,  not unlike pro-
tozoa [Maybe "proto.f" is the name which I am seeking.] being ob-
served through a microscope.
   I further reasoned that the word "you" is first learned as re-
ferring to the concept of self,  and only much later does the ego
turn the word "you" around to refer in speech to some "other."
   Whereas for some recent months I was worried  that the ambiva-
lent uses of "you" could not  be kept apart,  now today I can see
that the endo-flag will be like a logic-valve to make  sure  that
"self" you and "other" you are not mixed up.
   If the machine hears the word "you," then the endo-flag of the
fiber.n for "you" will activate the "self" proto-concept.
   But if the ego uses the word "you" in speech,  then a facet of
some "other" concept will be activating the fiber.n  "you" in or-
der to activate the auditory engram  "you"  during the "THINKING"
modality.  Even when the thought undergoes re-entry, there should
be an associative mechanism of suppressing the endo-flag  activa-
tion of the "self" concept.
   Likewise the word "I" is first heard in a way  which activates
the "other" concept.  [Isn't it  lucky  that language is a social
phenomenon?]  So hearing the word "I" activates the proto-concept
of "other," but thinking about "other" activates the word-concept
of "you."
   These  inmost  proto-concepts are like the heaving crankshafts
and lurching gears of massively heavy machinery, and similar also
to the flitting patterns of sunlight amid the leaves of a tree.

--
  /^^^^^^^^^^^\ Syntax Strings Together a Thought /^^^^^^^^^^^\
 /visual memory\           semantic ________     /  auditory   \
|      /--------|-------\  memory  / syntax \   |episodic memory|
|      |  recog-|nition |          \________/<--|-------------\ |
|   ___|___     |       |  flush-vector|  spiral|    _______  | |
|  /image  \    |     __|___        ___V___ loop|   /stored \ | |
| / percept \   |    /deep  \<-----/lexical\<---|--/ phonemes\| |
| \ engrams /<--|-->/concepts\--->/concepts \---|->\ of words/  |
|  \_______/    |   \________/    \_________/   |   \_______/   |
