Re: [ontolog-forum] More about the IBM Watson project

[William Frank <williamf.frank@xxxxxxxxx>]

On Tue, Sep 18, 2012 at 10:34 PM, John F Sowa <sowa@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

On 9/18/2012 9:37 AM, William Frank wrote:
> While AI is trying to get computers to act more like people, most
> traditional corporations are still trying to get people, at least people
> who produce software, to act more like simple computers.

That's true.  But that's not because they want to make people act
like computers.  The simple fact is that we are still very far from
designing computers that are as flexible as people.

Please note Slide 8 of the goal.pdf file (copy below).

In less than 3 years, Laura acquired a level of language understanding
that far surpasses anything that we can get our computers to do.

In fact, if her parents took her to any country in the world, she would
be chattering in the language of that country in just a few months --
while the parents would still be struggling with their phrase books.

And she would do that without any phrase books, dictionaries, or teachers.

This is a lovely example. The key to the direction this all has set me thinking is in your statement: 

"For everyone from Laura to Einstein, perception, action, and
mental models are more fundamental than language or logic."

which fits with the title of your paper with Arum Majumdar,

"Two Paradigms are Better than One, and Multiple Paradigms Even Better" 

I think this "better than" is not only for better modelling people in software, but is **why** people can make more effective decisions,  and also why the right teams working together the right way can make better decisions than individuals.
So, I am trying to shine the light of this wisdom about AI back on understanding what people themselves should be doing, hoping, and expecting of each other.   And, in general, I think that good ontology work can shed light back on people.

Wm

John
________________________________________________________________________

Source: http://www.jfsowa.com/talks/goal.pdf slide 8:

              The Ultimate Understanding Engine

Sentences uttered by a child named Laura before the age of 3. *

    Here’s a seat. It must be mine if it’s a little one.
    I went to the aquarium and saw the fish.
    I want this doll because she’s big.
    When I was a little girl, I could go “geek geek” like that,
    but now I can go “This is a chair.”

Laura used a larger subset of logic than Montague formalized.

No computer system today has Laura's ability to speak, learn,
and understand language.

* John Limber, The genesis of complex sentences. In T. Moore (Ed.),
Cognitive development and the acquisition of language. New York:
Academic Press, 1973.
http://pubpages.unh.edu/~jel/JLimber/Genesis_complex_sentences.pdf

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-- 
William Frank

413/376-8167


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