Programs and the World
Last Update: Wednesday, 20 September 2023 |
Note 1: Many of these items are online; links are given where they are known. Other items may also be online; an internet search should help you find them.
Note 2: In general, works are listed in chronological order.
(This makes it easier to follow the historical development of ideas.)
§16.2: Internal vs. External Behavior: Some Examples:
§16.3: Two Views of Computation:
says:
"the world is as it is independently of the interests of describers."
§16.4.3: Are Inputs Needed?
§16.7: Algorithms Don't Need a Purpose:
On that view, Marr's "computational" level is not teleological
(Egan 1991, p. 201).
and Albert Goldfain's work on how to get AI computer systems to
understand mathematics in addition to merely doing it:
§16.8: Algorithms and Goals:
§16.9: Computing with Symbols or Their Meanings:
For discussion, see:
These debates are also relevant to the
"abstract" Do A vs. the more "applied" To G,
do A.
§16.10: Syntactic, Internal, and Indigenous Semantics
On this view, representations are semantic in the sense of
§13.2.2.3: They are relations between two things, (1) that which
does the representing and (2) that which is represented. Could
something represent itself? If it could, it would be
syntactic, in the sense of §13.2.2.2. In syntactic
semantics (§16.10.2), one part of a system represents, or is
about, another part of that same system.
Next, note that if the content of a representation is what it is about or
refers to, then its content is external to the representation. But
later (§2.1, p. 7), the authors just quoted say this:
And that is why I find the term 'content' confusing. At best, there would
seem to be two kinds of content: an internal content carried by the
representing vehicle and an external content (which, like Santa Claus, need
not exist!)
InDeterminacy of computation. Synthese
"In his exposition of science,
Simon … divides it into two kinds: practical and theoretical.
Scientific propositions are practical if they
are stated in some such form as 'In order to produce such and such a
state of affairs, such and such must be done'
(Simon, H. A. (1947). Administrative Behavior.
Macmillan, New York, p. 248).
The equivalent
theoretical proposition with the same conditions of verification
can be stated in a purely descriptive form: 'Such and such a state of
affairs is invariably accompanied by such and such conditions'
(Simon 1947, p. 248)."
(Brown 2004, p. 1247, my italics)
"For
any possibility you can name, there exists a philosopher who turned it
into a theory"
(Casati, R. (2000). Shadows: Unlocking Their Secrets,
from Plato to Our Time. Vintage/Random House,
2004, New York. Translated by Abigail Asher; p. 65).
They may also be related to the distinction between
"pure" syntax vs "applied" semantic interpretation.
§16.11.2: Symbols: Marks vs. Meanings
"The defining
characteristic of representations is their aboutness, that is to say, the
fact that
representations are about something other than themselves. …
What representations are about or refer to are their contents
… ."
— Vernazzani, Alfredo and Coelho Mollo, Dimitri (2023),
"The Formats of Cognitive Representation: A Computational
Account", Philosophy of Science (forthcoming), §1,
p. 3; my italics.
"Coloured pieces of paper, binary code stored in a memory drive, and
patterns of neural
activation in the brain can all carry representational content: they can
all be
representations, say, of [a person]’s face. As carriers of content, these
internal states
and processes are called representational vehicles."
Copyright © 2023 by
William J. Rapaport
(rapaport@buffalo.edu)
http://www.cse.buffalo.edu/~rapaport/OR/A0fr16.html-20230920-2