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From: mentifex@scn.org (SCN User)
Subject: Re: Difference between 'I' and 'me'
Message-ID: <E4y0Gt.LF8@scn.org>
Sender: news@scn.org
Organization: Seattle Community Network
Date: Sat, 1 Feb 1997 21:17:16 GMT
Lines: 36


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.

The solution in Mind.rexx was to set up three separate arrays for
the representation of concepts and lexical items, as shown below:

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

The array of "deep concepts" holds primitive ideas:  self; other.
The intermediate "lexical" array controls onset-tags of phonemes.
The "auditory" array stores words, recallable by associative tag.

Activation of the deep "self" concept activates the lexical fiber
(neuronal fibergang) of "I" which in turn activates the word "I".

When Andru the Mentifex cyborg hears the word "I" externally, his
intermediate language-area interprets "I" as referring to "other"
(a member of the non-self class of "other") in the deep mindcore,
and so the appropriate links are tagged during the comprehension.
