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Article 4747 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: onstott@a.cs.okstate.edu (ONSTOTT CHARLES OR)
Subject: Re: Language as Technology: A Phenomenological Study
References: <1992Mar25.185007.21788@mp.cs.niu.edu> <1992Mar26.003003.20515@a.cs.okstate.edu> <1992Mar26.134711.10708@mp.cs.niu.edu>
Message-ID: <1992Mar26.223702.28641@a.cs.okstate.edu>
Organization: Oklahoma State University, Computer Science, Stillwater
Date: Thu, 26 Mar 92 22:37:02 GMT
Lines: 128

In article <1992Mar26.134711.10708@mp.cs.niu.edu> rickert@mp.cs.niu.edu (Neil Rickert) writes:
>In article <1992Mar26.003003.20515@a.cs.okstate.edu> onstott@a.cs.okstate.edu (ONSTOTT CHARLES OR) writes:
>>In article <1992Mar25.185007.21788@mp.cs.niu.edu> rickert@mp.cs.niu.edu (Neil Rickert) writes:
>>>
>>>In article <1992Mar25.080515.20086@a.cs.okstate.edu> onstott@a.cs.okstate.edu (ONSTOTT CHARLES OR) writes:
>> You realize, of course, that by saying this you are already falling
>>into the trap I am avoiding. You can not make the statement about computers-
>>having-languages-and-not-necessarily-intelligent and at the same time 
>>maintain that birds-have-a-remedial-language and are thus less intelligent.
>
>  Of course I can make such a statement.  As I already said, language is
>far from the whole story, so there is no contradiction here.  I did not
>claim that a bird's intelligence problem is purely a lack of adequate
>language; only that the inadequate analog language does not enhance
>intelligence the same way that digital language enhances human
>intelligence.
  Ah, but from my story, language does not enhance intelligence.  Language
is only a product of intelligence.  If anything, language increases the
number of interactions and the amount of knowledge.  But language itself
has no impact on intelligence.  It is intelligence that generates language.

>
>>The problem I am getting away from is our necessity to understand language
>>as having anything to do with intelligence.  Particularly from the
>
> Please make up your mind.  You stated (above) that language IS the whole
>story, and now you want to get away from language having anything to do
>with intelligence.  Which is it to be?
  Language is the WHOLE story for the RULE BASED stance, NOT for
MY stance.  Language is only an outcome of intelligence.  The rule based stance
maintatins that language has EVERYTHING to do with intelligence.  It is this
view which I am against.  Perhaps my first explaination was not clear.

>
>
> Sure, thought is possible without language.  But such non-linguistic thought
>is quite limited in comparison to thought using language.  My assertion
>"language has digitized humans" was an overstatement, which I acknowledged
>at the time by prefixing it with "in effect".  But the effects of the digital
>technology of language extend much further than to merely a digital output.
 By talking about digital effects, are you refering to the tendency for
language to think in contrasts?  Like good/evil, rich/poor, etc?

>
>>> Songbird language appears to be an analog language, and therefore does not
>>>offer the benefits of digital human language.
>
>> Ok, now you have lost me.  I see no reason why a songbird should have
>>an analog language and humans have a digital one by definition.  Please
>>elaborate.
>
> Human language is very much like that.  When we hear a spoken phrase we
>recognize it and recreate it.  There is no cumulative degradation.  This

First, I disagree with this.  I don't think this is right.  Second,
why do you deny, if I granted the first, the bird the ability to do this?

>
> But my point was that the rules for music are relatively simple, and are
>of minor importance.  They have little or anything to do with the expertise
>which comes from the coordination and the musical sensitivity derived from
>intense practice.

They may be simple, but they have everything to do with expertness.  How
does one become expert without learning the first principles?  Expertness
is the ability to go beyond the first principles, but those principles
MUST BE THERE to start with.
>
>>>The underlying analog recognition system still requires some form of
>>>calculation, but it is not the type of calculation that would be used
>>>in formal deductions.
>
>>Yes, but it is 'formal deductions' that we are talking about here.
>>Remember Socrates, this all rests on Socrates.
>
> If your definition of intelligence is limited to formal deductions, you
>have a very limited view.  Please note that there are already some quite
>good computer automated theorem provers which do this.  Most people who
>have seen these theorem provers at work are left with the strong
>feeling that there is something missing, and that intelligence requires
>much more.
 I think you are mistunderstanding me.  I am doing two things here: 
representing the phenomenological destruction of rule-based learning
whch can be traced back to Socrates.  Second, I am supporting a view that
intelligence exists before those rules.  Rules are of low intelligence,
hence most communication is carried out with low intelligence.  I have
always maintatined that intelligence is prior and more interesting than
language and rules.  Perhaps this distinction will help clear you up.
I agree that intelligence limited to formal deductions is a limited view,
this is why I am suggesting that intelligence goes BEYOND these principles.
We are not in disagreement on this point.

>
>  No.  Language really is digital.  Take your analog volt meter.  No matter
>how hard you stare at it, you will have trouble getting more than two to
>three digits of precision from it.  But, unlike analog technology, digital
>technlogy allows precision to be arbitrarily extended.  And language has
>this same property.  If we think it too limiting to talk about a forest,
>we can coin words for trees.  If we need still more precision, we coin
>words for tree trunks and branches.  For more we add words for leaves.
>Next we add words for leaflets; next veins and stomata within the leaves.
>In principle we can extend precision arbitrarily.
>
 Ah-ha!  I now see what you mean.  Yes, I can agree that language is digital.
(Sometimes, you just have to pound this stuff in my head.)  I am, however,
still in disagreement that the digital property of language impacts
human thinking is such a way that humans only think digitally.  As I have
stated, intelligence and thinking are prior to language.  Intelligence
generates thinking and the technology to communicate it.  The technology
is in language.


>  Neil W. Rickert, Computer Science               <rickert@cs.niu.edu>

BCnya,
  Charles O. Onstott, III

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Charles O. Onstott, III                  P.O. Box 2386
Undergraduate in Philosophy              Stillwater, Ok  74076
Oklahoma State University                onstott@a.cs.okstate.edu


"The most abstract system of philosophy is, in its method and purpose, 
nothing more than an extremely ingenious combination of natural sounds."
                                              -- Carl G. Jung
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