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Article 1785 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: zeleny@zariski.harvard.edu (Mikhail Zeleny)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.books,sci.philosophy.tech,comp.ai.philosophy
Subject: Re: Zeleny (was Re: Searle
Message-ID: <1991Dec1.113406.6027@husc3.harvard.edu>
Date: 1 Dec 91 16:34:05 GMT
References: <12513@pitt.UUCP> <5718@skye.ed.ac.uk> <12537@pitt.UUCP>
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In article <12537@pitt.UUCP> geb@dsl.pitt.edu (gordon e. banks) writes:
>In article <5718@skye.ed.ac.uk> jeff@aiai.UUCP (Jeff Dalton) writes:
>>In article <12513@pitt.UUCP> geb@cs.pitt.edu (Gordon Banks) writes:

GB:
>>>Not true.  Analog computers do not have symbols.  Neural
>>>network paradigms do not need symbols.  Much biologic
>>>computation (e.g. animals) is not symbolic.

JD:
>>That's all very well, but as soon as a computer is using words
>>such as, say, "tree", it will be dealing with symbols.  How
>>does it get them to refer?

GB:
>There have been some connectionist programs (such as Sejnowski's)
>that have learned to speak words.  These symbols were learned
>by reinforcing certain stimuli, so I suppose you could say they
>"refer" to the stimulus in some way.  In a more complex computer,
>such as the brain, the referents would be multiple and complex.

I would argue that the program's words merely refer to its internal
representation (under our interpretation, of course) of the stimulus, as,
regardless of how such a representation occurred, the program's response
would be the same.

'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`
`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'
: Qu'est-ce qui est bien?  Qu'est-ce qui est laid?         Harvard   :
: Qu'est-ce qui est grand, fort, faible...                 doesn't   :
: Connais pas! Connais pas!                                 think    :
:                                                             so     :
: Mikhail Zeleny                                                     :
: 872 Massachusetts Ave., Apt. 707                                   :
: Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139                                     :
: (617) 661-8151                                                     :
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:                                                                    :
'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`
`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'


