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From: jqb@netcom.com (Jim Balter)
Subject: Re: FIRST order?
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Date: Sun, 16 Jul 1995 08:09:15 GMT
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Michael Zeleny (zeleny@sepulveda.math.ucla.edu) wrote:
: >Samuel claimed long ago to have been surprised by the solutions arrived at by
: >his checkers program, which played much better than he.  Unless you want to
: >argue that he was so thoroughly acquainted with its programming that he
: >shouldn't have been surprised by its ability to surprise him.  One could
: >likewise argue that people's solutions should not surprise anyone thoroughly
: >acquainted with their biology.  After all, humans are not imbued with autonomy
: >simply because we say so (no magical factive quality of language, and all
: >that).  Perhaps more forceful is weemba's dismissal of "finite trash"; at
: >least that objection isn't countered by well-known factual examples.

: This is not a good analogy.  The program's solutions can be readily
: predicted from its design and implementation.

What nonsense.  As I just said, the program's solutions *were not* predicted.
I accuse you of a counterfactual, and as rebuttal you simply repeat the
counterfactual.  The solutions produced by programs that solve complex
problems cannot be "readily predicted from [their] design and implementation",
otherwise we wouldn't need to write them!  The solution to the four-color
theorem could not be "readily predicted from [the] design and implementation"
of the program that solved it.  Solutions produced by programs that simulate
chaotic processes cannot be "readily predicted from [their] design and
implementation".  You and Wiener live in a fantasy world where the only
programs are proof checkers that prove theorems you already "see" the truth of.

: To date, we have no
: means to predict human solutions on the basis of any amount of
: information concerning their biological function.  And introspective
: evidence suggests that any prediction of human behavior can be easily
: confuted by its subject, appointments in Samarra notwithstanding.  In
: principle, no such ability can be imputed to any mechanism.

I have programs that can easily defy any attempt of yours to predict their
behavior, arbitrary counterfactual claims notwithstanding.  Since their
behavior is chaotic, they in fact do this *in principle*.  GIC does not confer
upon you any ability to predict chaotic processes, in principle or otherwise,
your delusions of grandeur notwithstanding.

: >>Your interested audience is too full of true believers for my taste.  I
: >>read this thread on sci.logic, where a more balanced attitude prevails.

: >Modern journalism would seek balance between Hitler and Mother Theresa.  If
: >you believe that there is a fact of the matter, "balance" is hardly what you
: >should be seeking.

: I am easily bored by ignorant zealotry.

But not the zealotry of accomplished sophists, eh?

: >>The engineering point of view may be important in practice, but it will
: >>never make up for theoretical shortcomings.  The slide rule and the file
: >>cabinet can be readily augmented by Rube Goldberg-like devices meant to
: >>automate their function.  It is your job to specify at which point of
: >>such mechanical enhancement the humble appliances would acquire mental
: >>properties.

: >This strikes as a fallacy of the beard.

: If you are referring to the sorites paradox, neither you nor anyone
: else gave reason to regard mental predicates as similarly vague.  A
: methodological hypothesis underlying all empirical study is that that
: basic properties correspond to natural kinds, and give rise to sound
: and precise theoretical accounts of their structure and application.
: So if you wish to stipulate that mental faculties are not amenable to
: such analysis, the onus is on you to explain why.

Humble appliances acquire mental properties somewhere about the same point as
embryos do, or children acquire talless.  Terms are vague until their
referents are unambiguously established, and no amount of talented sophistry
of use of terms of art will change that.

-- 
<J Q B>

