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From: stevens@prodigal.psych.rochester.edu (Greg Stevens)
Subject: Re: Computers--Next stage in evolution? Hmmmmmm.....
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Date: Fri, 24 Mar 95 17:58:01 GMT
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In <mws.4.00A71980@pond.com> mws@pond.com (Fred Mitchell) writes:
>In article <XsXSlmJEWTq5073yn@iaccess.za> spike@iaccess.za (Mark Stockton) writes:

>>I would consider language as a sequential programming environment running
>>on a multiprocessor.

>More importantly, language (human) is a handful of symbols that in themselves 
>represent little information, but are linked to vast, vast resivors of 
>information in our minds. We speak at an appalingly slow pace, yet we are able 
>to covey complex concepts and idea with just a handful of symbols. Quite 
>remarkable, because we'd need to plug ISDN (or better) ports into everyone's 
>brain to get info across!

Well, it is only remarkable if you are looking at it from the perspective
of the fallacy that language actually communicates information -- that is,
that language allows us to encode something in our mental state, transmit
it, and get the hearer to decode it so that there is correspondance between
our two mental states.

Part of the reason we get so much meaning out of symbols is because of purely
internal reconstruction.  We construct meaning based on our associations
quite independant of the intent or associations of the speaker.  This is
not information being "transmitted."  It is a signal which triggers
associations within ourselves.  When someone says the word "specious" I
think of many things, including "religion" and "painted wooden rocking horse
from the play 'Inherit the Wind'" but neither of these are probably what is
being "transmitted."

Greg Stevens

stevens@prodigal.psych.rochester.edu

