DAVIS@EMBL.BITNET (06/09/87)
Ok, here's a quick query for old timers on the AIList (no prizes KIL for
being the first in line). Did the list ever show much of a response to
Doug Hofstadter's "Waking up From the Boolean Dream or, Subcognition as
Computation" ? Yes, yes - I know thats it a wet, cloudy, amorphous piece
of writing, utterly unpublishable in any journal beginning with the
name "Transactions of....", but nevertheless, Hoftstadter's criticism
of 'traditional' AI ("high church computationalism") still seems well in
place amidst the countless "has anyone seen expert system EXSYS yet ?"
and "any clues on dealing with uncertainty within the context of a
WHITEWASH based frame-solving fourth generation language ?" that
dominate the list......
I don't want to dig up the past, but if it hasn't happened before, are there
any defenders of the EXSYS/4GL/"fuzzy reasoning"/etc., etc., approach willing to
correct my impressions of the right direction for movement ?
Or even just give me a few recent, decent rebuffs to Hofstadter's viewpoint ?
yours in statistical emergence,
paul davis
"i wash my own clothes, i wash my own hair, i wash my own opinions"
nb: but my employers provide the washing machine, the shower & the computer.
davis@embl.bitnet