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Isaac
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 Posted: Tue Nov 18, 2008 3:31 am Post subject: Critique #5 Re: A Critique of Prof. Hubert Dreyfus' "Why Hei |
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All, here is a 5th installment of my very many critiques of this paper.
Again, not all issues will resonate with everyone so pick and choose what
you find
interesting to debate pro/con and I will defend any of my comments, and even
Dreyfus if
your critique is weak.
I first put the paragraph(s) I have a comment about, and highlight the
particular words at issue by enclosing them between "***" characters. Below
that are my critiques open for comment. I also include any citations in the
quoted section of the paper at the end of this post.
I seek (intelligent and informed) technical/theoretical/philosophical
critique or feedback from anyone on the issue(s) presented/raised.
See page 14, line 1:
Wheeler, however, hopes he can combine these approaches by appealing to the
account of involved problem solving which Heidegger calls dealing with the
unready-to-hand. Wheeler's point is that, unlike detached problem solving
with its general representations, the unready-to-hand requires
situation-specific representations. But, as we have seen, for Heidegger all
un-ready-to-hand coping takes place on the background of an even more basic
nonrepresentational holistic coping that allows copers to orient themselves
in the world.
Heidegger describes this background as "the background of... primary
familiarity, which itself is not conscious and intended but is rather
present in [an] unprominent way."[i] In Being and Time he speaks of "that
familiarity in accordance with which Dasein ... 'knows its way about' [sich
'auskennt] in its public environment" (405). This coping is like the
ready-to-hand in that it does not involve representations. So Heidegger
says explicitly that our background being-in-the-world, which he also calls
transcendence, does not involve representational intentionality, but,
rather, makes intentionality possible:
***Transcendence is a fundamental determination of the ontological structure
of the Dasein..Intentionality is founded in the Dasein's transcendence and
is possible solely for this reason-transcendence cannot conversely be
explained in terms of intentionality***[asb1] . [ii]
To be more exact, background coping is not a traditional kind of
intentionality. Whereas the ready-to-hand has conditions of satisfaction,
like hammering in the nail, background coping does not have conditions of
satisfaction. What would it be to succeed or fail in finding ones why
around in the familiar world? The important point for Heidegger, but not for
Wheeler, is that all coping, including unready-to-hand coping, takes place
on the background of this basic non-representational, holistic, absorbed,
kind of intentionality, which Heidegger calls being-in-the-world.[iii]
This is not a disagreement between Wheeler and me about the relative
frequency of dealing with the ready-to-hand and the unready-to-hand in
everyday experience. True, Wheeler emphasizes intermittent reflective
activities such as learning and practical problem solving, whereas I, like
Heidegger, emphasize pervasive activities like going out the door, walking
on the floor, turning on and off the lights, etc. The question of the
relative frequency of the ready-to-hand and the unready-to-hand modes of
being is, Wheeler and I agree, an empirical question.[iv]
But the issue concerning the background is not an empirical question. It is
an ontological question. And, as we have just seen, Heidegger is clear that
the mode of being of the world is not that of a collection of independent
modules that define what is relevant in specific situations. It seems to me
that Wheeler is on the right track, ***leaving modular solutions and action
oriented representations behind***[asb3] , when he writes:
[W]here one has CRC [***continuous reciprocal causation***[asb4] ] one will
have a non-modular system. ***Modularity is necessary for homuncularity and
thus, on my account, necessary for representation of any kind***.[asb5] To
the extent that the systems underlying intelligence are characterized by
CRC, they will be non-representational, and so the notion of action-oriented
representation won't help explain them. (Personal communication.)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
MY CRITIQUES indexed by my initials "ASB" followed by the number of my
comment above:
[asb1]I must say, with due respect, this sounds like psychobabble.
Representational intentionality verses a system that makes intentionality
possible is a false dichotomy as I see it. Simply put, model driven AI (al
la Brooks, et. al) is representational intentionality driven and data driven
AI (e.g., Neural networks, Genetic algorithms, Fuzzy logic, etc.) are
systems that make intentionality possible. So what? None of this seems
new, and misses the real problem (some of which are exemplified in my prior
comments). Data driven "coupling" methods do not magically avoid the frame
problem, they just ignore information they were not designed to capture and
result in systems that cannot capture context. Implementing the right
"gestalt" and computational framework is much more to the issue, not which
direction intentionality is driven from.
[asb3]I really think you are mixing up centralized verse distributed
architectural schemes. Modular solutions and action oriented
representations are not excluded from nature, so why should you exclude them
from the human cognitive condition? Indeed, if life is based on anything it
is based on Modular solutions and action oriented representations, which are
encoded by the DNA and acted upon by environmental context. Again, it seems
like you are creating/identifying problems that do not exist.
[asb4]as I see it is defined by Clark and Wheeler, CRC is "causation that
requires multiple, simultaneous interactions and dynamic feedback loops.
such that a) the causal contribution of each component in the system of
interest is determined by, and help to determine, the causal contributions
of other components, and b) those contributions may, as a result, change
quite radically as the process evolves."
Question: Is a hologram a CRC system? Because it is a captured interference
pattern each node has a distributed part of the image, to reconstruct the
represented image (a causal representation), "multiple, simultaneous
interactions" of each hologram node's phase information and the causal
contributions of any node depend entirely on "the causal contribution of
each component in the hologram system". If one thinks of the
reconstruction of a stored hologram as a spatiotemporal evolving process by
which the contribution of various nodes occurs as a dynamic process over
time and space and completely depends on the space-time evolution and the
coherence of the reconstructing light source, then " those [hologram node]
contributions may, as a result, change quite radically as the [illumination
and causal image reconstruction] process evolves ". In this way it seems
that a hologram satisfies the CRC definition. If you disagree, please be
specific and then I'll further refine the analogy to caption missing
behaviors you may identify.
[asb4]If so, then a hologram is clearly a very modular system. You can cut
away massive parts of the system and still reconstruct the image to various
levels of granularity. Because the phase information is stored in a kind of
distributed fractal scheme it is inherently modular, as any fractal
structure is by definition. Thus, a hologram is a CRC system that is
extremely modular. So, how do you reconcile that with "[W]here one has CRC
[continuous reciprocal causation ] one will have a non-modular system "?
Thus, if "systems underlying intelligence are characterized by CRC
[holograms], they [will be representational], and the notion of
action-oriented representation [could help] explain them " This is just one
kind of counter example. I think this further illustrates how your whole
philosophical cognitive logic ignore distributed representation systems, and
just focuses on typical centralized system like Brooks, et. al. It seems to
me you and Wheeler are fighting windmills... an interesting
philosophical/academic duel, but it does not seem to further the practical
issues of AI as a whole, especially not the frame problem.
On an aside, moreover, a hologram is the exact opposite of a homonuclear
system.
[asb5]Really? Classical Neural networks are certainly not modular, but
they certainly represent information/meaning in a very definite (if not
describable) fashion. How do you reconcile that?
CITATIONS MADE IN THE ABOVE QUOTED SECTION OF THE PAPER:
[i] Martin Heidegger, History of the Concept of Time , Trans. T. Kisiel,
(Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 19850), 189.
[ii] Martin Heidegger, The Basic Problems of Phenomenology, trans. A.
Hofstadter, (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1982), 162.
[iii] Moreover, the background solicitations are constantly enriched, not by
adding new bits of information as Wheeler suggests, but by allowing finer
and finer discriminations that show up in the world by way of the
intentional arc.
[iv] We agree too that both these modes of encountering the things in the
world are more frequent and more basic than appeal to general-purpose
reasoning and goal oriented planning. |
|
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 Back to top |
Immortalist
Guest
|
| Posted: Tue Nov 18, 2008 11:18 pm Post subject: Re: Critique #5 Re: A Critique of Prof. Hubert Dreyfus' "Why |
|
|
On Nov 17, 1:31 pm, "Isaac" <gro...@sonic.net> wrote:
| Quote: | [...]
See page 14, line 1:
Wheeler, however, hopes he can combine these approaches by appealing to the
account of involved problem solving which Heidegger calls dealing with the
unready-to-hand. Wheeler's point is that, unlike detached problem solving
with its general representations, the unready-to-hand requires
situation-specific representations. But, as we have seen, for Heidegger all
un-ready-to-hand coping takes place on the background of an even more basic
nonrepresentational holistic coping that allows copers to orient themselves
in the world.
Heidegger describes this background as "the background of... primary
familiarity, which itself is not conscious and intended but is rather
present in [an] unprominent way."[i] In Being and Time he speaks of "that
familiarity in accordance with which Dasein ... 'knows its way about' [sich
'auskennt] in its public environment" (405). This coping is like the
ready-to-hand in that it does not involve representations. So Heidegger
says explicitly that our background being-in-the-world, which he also calls
transcendence, does not involve representational intentionality, but,
rather, makes intentionality possible:
***Transcendence is a fundamental determination of the ontological structure
of the Dasein..Intentionality is founded in the Dasein's transcendence and
is possible solely for this reason-transcendence cannot conversely be
explained in terms of intentionality***[asb1] . [ii]
To be more exact, background coping is not a traditional kind of
intentionality. Whereas the ready-to-hand has conditions of satisfaction,
like hammering in the nail, background coping does not have conditions of
satisfaction. What would it be to succeed or fail in finding ones why
around in the familiar world? The important point for Heidegger, but not for
Wheeler, is that all coping, including unready-to-hand coping, takes place
on the background of this basic non-representational, holistic, absorbed,
kind of intentionality, which Heidegger calls being-in-the-world.[iii]
This is not a disagreement between Wheeler and me about the relative
frequency of dealing with the ready-to-hand and the unready-to-hand in
everyday experience. True, Wheeler emphasizes intermittent reflective
activities such as learning and practical problem solving, whereas I, like
Heidegger, emphasize pervasive activities like going out the door, walking
on the floor, turning on and off the lights, etc. The question of the
relative frequency of the ready-to-hand and the unready-to-hand modes of
being is, Wheeler and I agree, an empirical question.[iv]
But the issue concerning the background is not an empirical question. It is
an ontological question. And, as we have just seen, Heidegger is clear that
the mode of being of the world is not that of a collection of independent
modules that define what is relevant in specific situations. It seems to me
that Wheeler is on the right track, ***leaving modular solutions and action
oriented representations behind***[asb3] , when he writes:
[W]here one has CRC [***continuous reciprocal causation***[asb4] ] one will
have a non-modular system. ***Modularity is necessary for homuncularity and
thus, on my account, necessary for representation of any kind***.[asb5] To
the extent that the systems underlying intelligence are characterized by
CRC, they will be non-representational, and so the notion of action-oriented
representation won't help explain them. (Personal communication.)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
MY CRITIQUES indexed by my initials "ASB" followed by the number of my
comment above:
|
Man these 20th century guys, why not go back to the original pre-
computer computer Kant - the Critique of Pure Reason, isn't everything
after just an altered "copy"?
| Quote: | [asb1]I must say, with due respect, this sounds like psychobabble.
Representational intentionality verses a system that makes intentionality
possible is a false dichotomy as I see it. Simply put, model driven AI (al
la Brooks, et. al) is representational intentionality driven and data driven
AI (e.g., Neural networks, Genetic algorithms, Fuzzy logic, etc.) are
systems that make intentionality possible. So what? None of this seems
new, and misses the real problem (some of which are exemplified in my prior
comments). Data driven "coupling" methods do not magically avoid the frame
problem, they just ignore information they were not designed to capture and
result in systems that cannot capture context. Implementing the right
"gestalt" and computational framework is much more to the issue, not which
direction intentionality is driven from.
[asb3]I really think you are mixing up centralized verse distributed
architectural schemes. Modular solutions and action oriented
representations are not excluded from nature, so why should you exclude them
from the human cognitive condition? Indeed, if life is based on anything it
is based on Modular solutions and action oriented representations, which are
encoded by the DNA and acted upon by environmental context. Again, it seems
like you are creating/identifying problems that do not exist.
|
When you say modular solutions in some animals does it go along with
the propositons below? If so I complement you on being on the real
cutting edge if you are considering the input from evolutionary
psychology when formulating ideas about AL[I] http://tinyurl.com/AI-Gospel
"The Swiss Army knife is a flexible tool. Its flexibility is not the
result of having just one tool that is applied to all problems.
Instead, it is a bundle of tools, each well-designed for solving a
different problem – scissors for cutting paper, corkscrew for opening
wine, toothpick for cleaning teeth. Each solves a different problem
well, thereby providing flexible problem solving ability. Similarly,
the human mind does not have just one blunt tool for solving all
problems – and if it did, we would be very limited indeed. Each human
mind contains a large number of programs, each well-designed for
solving a different adaptive problem: choosing a good mate, caring for
children, foraging for food, avoiding predators, navigating a
landscape, forming coalitions, trading, defending one’s family against
aggression, and so on. We are flexible problem solvers in part because
our minds contain so many well-engineered tools."
- - Leda Cosmides
http://www.psych.ucsb.edu/research/cep/ledainterview.htm
The mind is composed of a large number of mental modules each designed
to solve a specific problem. For example, there is one mechanism for
perceiving three dimensions, another for anger, another for falling in
love. The mind is like a Swiss Army knife; i.e., it has lots of
specialized tools. There is no such thing as general intelligence,
general learning, or any other general ability to solve problems.
http://www.csulb.edu/~kmacd/463evolpsyIQ.html
....Rather than regarding the mind at birth as a content-free, blank
slate on which are inscribed the skills and values of the culture of
an individual, evolutionary psychology posits the existence of innate
interests, capacities, and tastes, laid down through processes of
natural and sexual selection. Evolutionary psychology replaces the
blank slate as a metaphor for mind with the Swiss army knife: the mind
is a set of tools and capacities specifically adapted to important
tasks and interests.
These acquisitions are adaptations to life in the small hunter-
gatherer bands in which our ancestors lived for 100,000 generations
before civilization as we now understand it began. They include a long
list of universal features of the Stone Age, hunter-gatherer mind: for
example language use according to syntactic rules; kinship systems
with incest avoidance; phobias, e.g. fear of snakes and spiders; child-
nurturing interests; nepotism, the favouring of blood relations; a
sense of justice, fairness, and obligations associated with emotions
of anger and revenge; the capacity to make and use hand tools; status
and rank ordering in human relations; a sense of food purity and
contamination; and so forth (Pinker 1997).
Some of these features are uniform across the human species; others
are statistically related to sex; for instance, females are more
inclined towards an interest in child nurturing and have a greater
ability to remember details in visual experience, while males are more
physically aggressive, and better able to determine directionality and
engage in “map reading.”
http://www.denisdutton.com/aesthetics_&_evolutionary_psychology.htm
http://thebrain.mcgill.ca/flash/d/d_05/d_05_p/d_05_p_her/d_05_p_her.html
http://www.skeptic.com/the_magazine/featured_articles/v12n01_here_to_stay.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modular
| Quote: | [asb4]as I see it is defined by Clark and Wheeler, CRC is "causation that
requires multiple, simultaneous interactions and dynamic feedback loops.
such that a) the causal contribution of each component in the system of
interest is determined by, and help to determine, the causal contributions
of other components, and b) those contributions may, as a result, change
quite radically as the process evolves."
|
I think with most analogies with the mammilian nervous system that
there is some ambiguity in the sentence "CRC is 'causation that
requires multiple, simultaneous interactions and dynamic feedback
loops. such that a) the causal contribution of each component in the
system of interest is determined by, and help to determine, the causal
contributions of other components, and b) those contributions may, as
a result, change quite radically as the process evolves.' ", since the
species slowely evolves but many mental thermostats are set within
specific ranges, in humans withing the range of about 200 instincts.
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.philosophy/msg/c983937729d43250?
Various aquisition devices that guide learning along particular
pathways towards human biases. And as E.O. Wilson might say mental
development appears to be genetically constrained.
(1) Language Aquisition Device
(2) Color Aqusition Device
(3) Sound Aquistion Device
(4) Smell Aquisition Device
(5) Touch Aquisition Device
(6) Art Aquisition Device
(7) Taste Aquisition Device
| Quote: | Question: Is a hologram a CRC system? Because it is a captured interference
pattern each node has a distributed part of the image, to reconstruct the
represented image (a causal representation), "multiple, simultaneous
interactions" of each hologram node's phase information and the causal
contributions of any node depend entirely on "the causal contribution of
each component in the hologram system". If one thinks of the
reconstruction of a stored hologram as a spatiotemporal evolving process by
which the contribution of various nodes occurs as a dynamic process over
time and space and completely depends on the space-time evolution and the
coherence of the reconstructing light source, then " those [hologram node]
contributions may, as a result, change quite radically as the [illumination
and causal image reconstruction] process evolves ". In this way it seems
that a hologram satisfies the CRC definition. If you disagree, please be
specific and then I'll further refine the analogy to caption missing
behaviors you may identify.
[asb4]If so, then a hologram is clearly a very modular system. You can cut
away massive parts of the system and still reconstruct the image to various
levels of granularity. Because the phase information is stored in a kind of
distributed fractal scheme it is inherently modular, as any fractal
structure is by definition. Thus, a hologram is a CRC system that is
extremely modular. So, how do you reconcile that with "[W]here one has CRC
[continuous reciprocal causation ] one will have a non-modular system "?
Thus, if "systems underlying intelligence are characterized by CRC
[holograms], they [will be representational], and the notion of
action-oriented representation [could help] explain them " This is just one
kind of counter example. I think this further illustrates how your whole
philosophical cognitive logic ignore distributed representation systems, and
just focuses on typical centralized system like Brooks, et. al. It seems to
me you and Wheeler are fighting windmills... an interesting
philosophical/academic duel, but it does not seem to further the practical
issues of AI as a whole, especially not the frame problem.
On an aside, moreover, a hologram is the exact opposite of a homonuclear
system.
[asb5]Really? Classical Neural networks are certainly not modular, but
they certainly represent information/meaning in a very definite (if not
describable) fashion. How do you reconcile that?
CITATIONS MADE IN THE ABOVE QUOTED SECTION OF THE PAPER:
[i] Martin Heidegger, History of the Concept of Time , Trans. T. Kisiel,
(Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 19850), 189.
[ii] Martin Heidegger, The Basic Problems of Phenomenology, trans. A.
Hofstadter, (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1982), 162.
[iii] Moreover, the background solicitations are constantly enriched, not by
adding new bits of information as Wheeler suggests, but by allowing finer
and finer discriminations that show up in the world by way of the
intentional arc.
[iv] We agree too that both these modes of encountering the things in the
world are more frequent and more basic than appeal to general-purpose
reasoning and goal oriented planning. |
|
|
| |
|
| Back to top |
Alpha
Guest
|
| Posted: Wed Nov 19, 2008 6:28 pm Post subject: Re: Critique #5 Re: A Critique of Prof. Hubert Dreyfus' "Why |
|
|
On Nov 18, 4:18 pm, Immortalist <reanimater_2...@yahoo.com> wrote:
| Quote: | On Nov 17, 1:31 pm, "Isaac" <gro...@sonic.net> wrote:
[...]
See page 14, line 1:
Wheeler, however, hopes he can combine these approaches by appealing to the
account of involved problem solving which Heidegger calls dealing with the
unready-to-hand. Wheeler's point is that, unlike detached problem solving
with its general representations, the unready-to-hand requires
situation-specific representations. But, as we have seen, for Heidegger all
un-ready-to-hand coping takes place on the background of an even more basic
nonrepresentational holistic coping that allows copers to orient themselves
in the world.
Heidegger describes this background as "the background of... primary
familiarity, which itself is not conscious and intended but is rather
present in [an] unprominent way."[i] In Being and Time he speaks of "that
familiarity in accordance with which Dasein ... 'knows its way about' [sich
'auskennt] in its public environment" (405). This coping is like the
ready-to-hand in that it does not involve representations. So Heidegger
says explicitly that our background being-in-the-world, which he also calls
transcendence, does not involve representational intentionality, but,
rather, makes intentionality possible:
***Transcendence is a fundamental determination of the ontological structure
of the Dasein..Intentionality is founded in the Dasein's transcendence and
is possible solely for this reason-transcendence cannot conversely be
explained in terms of intentionality***[asb1] . [ii]
To be more exact, background coping is not a traditional kind of
intentionality. Whereas the ready-to-hand has conditions of satisfaction,
like hammering in the nail, background coping does not have conditions of
satisfaction. What would it be to succeed or fail in finding ones why
around in the familiar world? The important point for Heidegger, but not for
Wheeler, is that all coping, including unready-to-hand coping, takes place
on the background of this basic non-representational, holistic, absorbed,
kind of intentionality, which Heidegger calls being-in-the-world.[iii]
This is not a disagreement between Wheeler and me about the relative
frequency of dealing with the ready-to-hand and the unready-to-hand in
everyday experience. True, Wheeler emphasizes intermittent reflective
activities such as learning and practical problem solving, whereas I, like
Heidegger, emphasize pervasive activities like going out the door, walking
on the floor, turning on and off the lights, etc. The question of the
relative frequency of the ready-to-hand and the unready-to-hand modes of
being is, Wheeler and I agree, an empirical question.[iv]
But the issue concerning the background is not an empirical question. It is
an ontological question. And, as we have just seen, Heidegger is clear that
the mode of being of the world is not that of a collection of independent
modules that define what is relevant in specific situations. It seems to me
that Wheeler is on the right track, ***leaving modular solutions and action
oriented representations behind***[asb3] , when he writes:
[W]here one has CRC [***continuous reciprocal causation***[asb4] ] one will
have a non-modular system. ***Modularity is necessary for homuncularity and
thus, on my account, necessary for representation of any kind***.[asb5] To
the extent that the systems underlying intelligence are characterized by
CRC, they will be non-representational, and so the notion of action-oriented
representation won't help explain them. (Personal communication.)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
MY CRITIQUES indexed by my initials "ASB" followed by the number of my
comment above:
Man these 20th century guys, why not go back to the original pre-
computer computer Kant - the Critique of Pure Reason, isn't everything
after just an altered "copy"?
[asb1]I must say, with due respect, this sounds like psychobabble.
Representational intentionality verses a system that makes intentionality
possible is a false dichotomy as I see it. Simply put, model driven AI (al
la Brooks, et. al) is representational intentionality driven and data driven
AI (e.g., Neural networks, Genetic algorithms, Fuzzy logic, etc.) are
systems that make intentionality possible. So what? None of this seems
new, and misses the real problem (some of which are exemplified in my prior
comments). Data driven "coupling" methods do not magically avoid the frame
problem, they just ignore information they were not designed to capture and
result in systems that cannot capture context. Implementing the right
"gestalt" and computational framework is much more to the issue, not which
direction intentionality is driven from.
[asb3]I really think you are mixing up centralized verse distributed
architectural schemes. Modular solutions and action oriented
representations are not excluded from nature, so why should you exclude them
from the human cognitive condition? Indeed, if life is based on anything it
is based on Modular solutions and action oriented representations, which are
encoded by the DNA and acted upon by environmental context. Again, it seems
like you are creating/identifying problems that do not exist.
When you say modular solutions in some animals does it go along with
the propositons below? If so I complement you on being on the real
cutting edge if you are considering the input from evolutionary
psychology when formulating ideas about AL[I]http://tinyurl.com/AI-Gospel
"The Swiss Army knife is a flexible tool. Its flexibility is not the
result of having just one tool that is applied to all problems.
Instead, it is a bundle of tools, each well-designed for solving a
different problem – scissors for cutting paper, corkscrew for opening
wine, toothpick for cleaning teeth. Each solves a different problem
well, thereby providing flexible problem solving ability. Similarly,
the human mind does not have just one blunt tool for solving all
problems – and if it did, we would be very limited indeed. Each human
mind contains a large number of programs, each well-designed for
solving a different adaptive problem: choosing a good mate, caring for
children, foraging for food, avoiding predators, navigating a
landscape, forming coalitions, trading, defending one’s family against
aggression, and so on. We are flexible problem solvers in part because
our minds contain so many well-engineered tools."
- - Leda Cosmideshttp://www.psych.ucsb.edu/research/cep/ledainterview.htm
|
Cosmides and Tooby's evolutionary psychology ideas were critiqued,
demolished,, refuted and shown to be without merit, in detail, by
Buller in Adapting Minds book; their contentions and theories are
rubbish and the evidence they cite does not actually show what they
contend it shows.
| Quote: |
The mind is composed of a large number of mental modules each designed
to solve a specific problem. For example, there is one mechanism for
perceiving three dimensions, another for anger, another for falling in
love. The mind is like a Swiss Army knife; i.e., it has lots of
specialized tools. There is no such thing as general intelligence,
general learning, or any other general ability to solve problems.
http://www.csulb.edu/~kmacd/463evolpsyIQ.html
...Rather than regarding the mind at birth as a content-free, blank
slate on which are inscribed the skills and values of the culture of
an individual, evolutionary psychology posits the existence of innate
interests, capacities, and tastes, laid down through processes of
natural and sexual selection. Evolutionary psychology replaces the
blank slate as a metaphor for mind with the Swiss army knife: the mind
is a set of tools and capacities specifically adapted to important
tasks and interests.
|
Nope! Mind is adaptational - adapting, rather than a set of specific
adaptions. (Note there is a world of difference betwen a set of
specific adaptions and the capability of adapting).
| Quote: |
These acquisitions are adaptations to life in the small hunter-
gatherer bands in which our ancestors lived for 100,000 generations
|
We have no detailed knowledge of life then, which is absolutely
required to formulate that specific adaptatioons actually occurred.
| Quote: | before civilization as we now understand it began. They include a long
list of universal features of the Stone Age, hunter-gatherer mind: for
example language use according to syntactic rules; kinship systems
with incest avoidance; phobias, e.g. fear of snakes and spiders; child-
nurturing interests; nepotism, the favouring of blood relations; a
sense of justice, fairness, and obligations associated with emotions
of anger and revenge; the capacity to make and use hand tools; status
and rank ordering in human relations; a sense of food purity and
contamination; and so forth (Pinker 1997).
Some of these features are uniform across the human species; others
are statistically related to sex; for instance, females are more
inclined towards an interest in child nurturing and have a greater
ability to remember details in visual experience, while males are more
physically aggressive, and better able to determine directionality and
engage in “map reading.”
|
Which have been show to not be universal in nature per Buller.
| Quote: |
http://www.denisdutton.com/aesthetics_&_evolutionary_psychology.htm
http://thebrain.mcgill.ca/flash/d/d_05/d_05_p/d_05_p_her/d_05_p_her.htmlhttp://www.skeptic.com/the_magazine/featured_articles/v12n01_here_to_...http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modular
[asb4]as I see it is defined by Clark and Wheeler, CRC is "causation that
requires multiple, simultaneous interactions and dynamic feedback loops..
such that a) the causal contribution of each component in the system of
interest is determined by, and help to determine, the causal contributions
of other components, and b) those contributions may, as a result, change
quite radically as the process evolves."
I think with most analogies with the mammilian nervous system that
there is some ambiguity in the sentence "CRC is 'causation that
requires multiple, simultaneous interactions and dynamic feedback
loops. such that a) the causal contribution of each component in the
system of interest is determined by, and help to determine, the causal
contributions of other components, and b) those contributions may, as
a result, change quite radically as the process evolves.' ", since the
species slowely evolves but many mental thermostats are set within
specific ranges, in humans ...
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