[agi] Logic and Knowledge Representation

[John Scanlon]

Is anyone interested in discussing the use of formal logic as the foundation for knowledge representation schemes for AI?  It's a common approach, but I think it's the wrong path.  Even if you add probability or fuzzy logic, it's still insufficient for true intelligence.   The human brain, the only high-level intelligent system currently known, uses language and logic for abstract reasoning, but these are based on, and owe their existence to, a more fundamental level of intelligence -- that of pattern-recognition, pattern-matching, and pattern manipulation.   Philosophers have grappled with the question of the source of knowledge for as long as there have been philosophers, and one of the best accepted answers in modern philosophy is sensory experience.  Sensory experience, including proprioception and awareness of motor outputs, in addition to the ordinary five senses, is the material that knowledge is built out of.  The brain constructs its logical formulations out of the basic building blocks of the sights, sounds, and feels of linguistic symbols.  The symbols themselves (letters of an alphabet, words in a language, etc.) are built up out of lower-level sensory patterns.   In evolution on earth, sensory-motor-based intelligence came first, and the use of language and logic only later.  It seems to me that the right path to true AI will also use sensory-motor patterns as the basic building blocks of knowledge representation.  A typical human being's knowledge of the letter "A" involves recognition of graphical representations of the symbol, memories of its sound when spoken, procedural or muscle memory of how to speak and write it, and memories of where it is commonly found in its linguistic context.  A system should be capable of recognizing symbols visually or auditorially (and possibly of generating them through motor outputs) before it should be expected to comprehend them.   Any thoughts or arguments?  Or am I just repeating something everyone already knows?  (I honestly don't know.)   J.P.   To unsubscribe, change your address, or temporarily deactivate your subscription, please go to http://v2.listbox.com/member/[EMAIL PROTECTED]