pollack@dendrite.cis.ohio-state.edu (Jordan B Pollack) (10/03/90)
What a nice startup discussion for a new group! I agree with Marvin, and attempt to paraphrase: Behaviors (Functions) are caused by organizations of moving parts (structures) operating in (situated in) some environment. When we (observers) do not understand the principles and distinct primitives involved in this causal link, we must view the function as emergent. However, the "emergent movement" does present some challenge to the "we can engineer it" approach to AI, because only when we (pretty much) understand the principles and primitives involved in a complex natural function can we engineer artificial devices to accomplish that function. And we are quite far from understanding the principles and primitives involved in brain-causing-mind! So far, we work with few candidates for AI principles, such as the knowledge/search tradeoff, and the idea of universal symbolic computation, along with a few distinctions - between information and control, and between syntax and semantics. If these distinctions slice the wrong way, or if our understanding of the principles is too incomplete, then, like human flight, the field might need to tinker for centuries. My view is that the emergent computation movement (which lumps together connectionist networks with genetic algorithms, artificial life, computational neurethology, hierarchal control theory, etc.) is valuable for the reason that computers can help speed up the process of human discovery (and refinement) of the principles of intelligence, as follows: Build, learn, or evolve a structure of moving software parts. Does it have an interesting function? If it does, Why? Usually, because you set it up in the environment, the fitness function, (or the cuteness of the computer's peripherals)! But how is it done? Aha, I don't understand it yet, must be an emergent behavior! Can new principles be found this way? Yes, because we now have an working system with an organization of representations and processes to analyse. By the way, Penrose also ignored my speculation on consciousness: The brain is like a planet, and the mind is its weather. Therefore consciousness is merely a local phenomena of order which emerges (oops!) from chaos, just like a tornado or the red spot of jupiter. -- Jordan Pollack Assistant Professor CIS Dept/OSU Laboratory for AI Research 2036 Neil Ave Email: pollack@cis.ohio-state.edu Columbus, OH 43210 Fax/Phone: (614) 292-4890