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Article 1564 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: Searle (was Re: Daniel Dennett (was Re: Comme
Message-ID: <1991Nov25.105711.5869@husc3.harvard.edu>
Date: 25 Nov 91 15:57:09 GMT
References: <1991Nov14.223348.4076@milton.u.washington.edu> <YAMAUCHI.91Nov25000101@indigo.cs.rochester.edu>
Organization: Dept. of Math, Harvard Univ.
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In article <YAMAUCHI.91Nov25000101@indigo.cs.rochester.edu> 
yamauchi@cs.rochester.edu (Brian Yamauchi) writes:

>In article <1991Nov24.195230.5843@husc3.harvard.edu> 
>zeleny@zariski.harvard.edu (Mikhail Zeleny) writes:

>>In article <MATT.91Nov24000158@physics.berkeley.edu> 
>>matt@physics.berkeley.edu (Matt Austern) writes:

MA:
>>>It isn't terribly clear to me what kind of system could possibly do
>>>anything other than symbolic manipulation, defined so expansively.
>>>This argument makes me nervous just because it is so terribly broad:
>>>if an argument seems to apply to everything, it suggests to me that
>>>there is a logical flaw in it somewhere.

MZ:
>>A symbol is an iconic or a substitutive sign, something that stands for
>>something else, *aliquid stat pro aliquo*.  A C function is a symbol
>>standing for an assembly language algorithm, and, eventually, for a
>>sequence of machine language instructions, in virtue of your system's
>>compilers.  Pray tell, what part of the computer hardware or software could
>>make it stand for something outside the machine, as signs used by humans
>>stand for things in virtue of their meanings?

BY:
>Well, maybe we're getting somewhere now...

Don't get too excited: a C function can only be seen as a symbol standing
for an assembly language algorithm, and, eventually, for a sequence of
machine language instructions, in virtue of your system's compilers, *as
interpreted by the machine's designers*.

BY:
>So would you call a "syntactic" symbol one which just refers to
>something inside the computer hardware/software and a "semantic"
>symbol one which refers to something outside the computer?

No, I wouldn't: these terms have standard meanings.  Call them `connected'
and `disconnected'.

BY:
>In that case, consider a robot vision system.  The robot looks down on
>a table covered with tools.  It's vision system identifies the various
>tools (hammer, screwdriver, wrench) and stores information about their
>position and orientation in the robot's memory.  These symbols (e.g.
>"hammer (10, 50, pi)") now refer to an object that exists in the real
>world.  If I move the hammer, the corresponding symbolic information
>will also change as the robot perceives the hammer's new position and
>orientation.  Thus by the definition above, these "symbols" now have
>"semantics" as well as "syntax".

Now we are back to early Russell and his "knowledge by acquaintance"; the
problem is that you can only know by acquaintance, and so denote by
logically proper, non-connotative names, your own sense-data; in other
words, logically proper names can only be said to denote the phenomena to
which they are internally connected.  This says nothing whatsoever about
the external objects which cause the visual representations.  Even from the
discredited phenomenalist standpoint, material objects have to be seen not
just as sets of sense-data, but as *possibilities* of causing sense-data
(cf. Mill with his view of matter as permanent possibility of sensation).


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:                                                             so     :
: Mikhail Zeleny                                                     :
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