MIKE TINTNER>>>> "Isn't it obvious that the brain is able to understand the
wealth of language by relatively few computations - quite intricate,
hierarchical, multi-levelled processing,"
ED PORTER>>>> How do you find the right set of "relatively few computations"
and/or models that are appropriate in a complex context without massive
computation?
Ed, Contrary to my PM, maybe I should answer this in more precise detail.My
hypothesis is as follows: the brain does most of its thinking, and
particularly adaptive thinking, by look-up not by "blind" search.
How can you or I deal with :
"Get that box out of this house now.."
How is it say, that I will be able to think of a series of ideas like "get
ten men to carry it," "get a fork-lift truck to move it", "use large
levers", "get hold of some heavy ropes ..." etc etc. straight off the top
of my head in well under a minute?
All of those ideas are derived from visual/sensory images/ schemas of large
objects being moved. The brain does not, I suggest, consult digital/ verbal
lists or networks of verbal ideas about "moving boxes out of houses" or any
similar set of verbal concepts, (except v. occasionally).
How then does the brain rapidly pull relevant large-object-moving shapes out
of memory? (There are obviously more operations involved here than just
shape search, but that's what I want to concentrate on). Now this is where
I confess again to being a general techno-idiot (although I suspect that in
this particular area most of you may be, too). My confused idea is that if
you have a stack of shapes, there are ways to pull out/ spot the relevant
ones quickly without sorting through the stack one by one. I think Hawkins
suggests something like this in ON INtelligence. Maybe you can have thoughts
about this.
(Alternatively, the again confused idea occurs that certain neuronal areas,
when stimulated with a certain shape, may be able to remember similar shapes
that have been there before - v. loosely as certain metals when heated, can
remember/ resume old forms)
Whatever, I am increasingly confident that the brain does work v.
extensively by matching shapes physically, (rather than by first converting
them into digital/symbolic form). And I recommend here Sandra Blakeslee's
latest book on body maps - & the opening Ramachandran quote -
"When a reporter asked the famous biologist JBS Haldane what his biological
studies had taught about God, Haldane replied:"The creator if he exists must
have an inordinate fondness for beetles" since there are more species of
beetle than any other group of living creqtures. By the same token, a
neurologist might conclude that God is a cartographer. He must have an
inordinate fondness for maps, for everywhere you look in the brain maps
abound."
If I'm headed even loosely in the right direction here, only analog
computation will be able to handle the kind of rapid shape matching and
searches I'm talking about, as opposed to the inordinately long, blind
symbolic searches of digital computation. And you're going to need a whole
new kind of computer. But none of you guys are prepared to even contemplate
that.
P.S. One important feature of shape searches by contrast with digital,
symbolic searches is that "you don't make mistakes." IOW when we think
about a problem like getting the box out of a house, all our ideas, I
suggest, will be to some extent relevant. They may not totally solve the
problem, but they will fit some of the requirements, precisely because they
have been derived by shape comparison. When a computer blindly searches
lists of symbols by contrast, most of them of course are totally irrelevant.
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