To clarify the comments I made yesterday, I'd like to emphasize
the distinction between science and engineering: (01)
> The connective 'vs' is inappropriate in such discussions:
>
>> mental representation vs. connectionism.
>
> There is no logical reason why there should be any conflict between
> those studies...
>
> Any theory that cannot explain all those phenomena (plus
> many more that would fill volumes to enumerate) is inadequate.
> As neuroscientists emphasize, nobody knows how the brain works,
> and it is a serious *blunder* to exclude any phenomena. (02)
I regard *every* algorithm developed and used in AI as an
engineering solution to practical problems. And I do *not* make
value judgments in comparing science, engineering, and philosophy.
Intellectually, there are good and bad, great and stupid, useful
and useless examples of all of them. (03)
When anybody talks about symbolic, connectionist, conceptual,
or subconceptual methods, I emphasize that they are *primarily*
engineering solutions. Aspects of them *may be* combined in
various scientific and philosophical theories -- but any such
theories we can form today are certain to be obsolete as new
discoveries are made. (04)
I recently heard an interview about some fraudulent results that
were published in a peer-reviewed journal. The interviewer asked
the editor of a major journal about the percentage of published
articles in earlier years that are false. His answer was simple:
"All of them. That is the way science progresses." (05)
And when it comes to neuroscience, the great advances of the past
half century have shown that there's an immense amount that we
don't know. Some current theories are useful. But as the journal
editor said, they may contain a kernel of truth, but they'll all
be falsified in the long run. (06)
John (07)
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