Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!mnetor!seismo!ut-sally!husc6!mit-eddie!rutgers!clyde!cbatt!ihnp4!alberta!ubc-vision!ubc-cs!andrews From: andrews@ubc-cs.UUCP (Jamie Andrews) Newsgroups: comp.ai Subject: Re: Challenge to Connectionists Message-ID: <740@ubc-cs.UUCP> Date: Mon, 22-Dec-86 18:55:48 EST Article-I.D.: ubc-cs.740 Posted: Mon Dec 22 18:55:48 1986 Date-Received: Wed, 24-Dec-86 00:08:24 EST References: <425@mind.UUCP> Reply-To: andrews@ubc-cs.UUCP (Jamie Andrews) Organization: UBC Department of Computer Science, Vancouver, B.C., Canada Lines: 38 Keywords: connectionism, Perceptrons, artificial intelligence, neural models In article <425@mind.UUCP> harnad@mind.UUCP (Stevan Harnad) writes: >... meeting one or the other of the >following criteria will be necessary: > (i) Prove formally that not only is C not subject to perceptron-like > constraints, but that it does have the power to generate > mental capacity. > (ii) Demonstrate C's power to generate mental capacity empirically... Minsky and Papert's analysis of perceptrons was based on a very exact and restricted type of machine. It seems to me that the emphasis in the discussion about connectionism should be on proving that the connectionist approach cannot work (possibly *using* _Perceptrons_-like arguments), rather than that _Perceptrons_-like proofs *cannot* be applied to connectionism. I think both connectionists and anti-connectionists should be involved in this proof process, however. I wouldn't want the discussion to turn into yet another classic AI political battle. >To summarize, my challenge to connectionists is that they either >provide (1) formal proof or (ii) empirical evidence for their claims >about the present or future capacity of C to model human performance >or its underlying function. If you mean by this that we should not study connectionism until connectionists have done one of these things, then (as you point out) we might as well write off the rest of AI too. The main thing should be to try to learn as much from the connectionist model as possible, and to accept any proofs of uselessness if someone should come up with them. We can't expect to turn all connectionist researchers into Minskys in order to prove theorems about it that must needs be very complex. --Jamie. ...!seismo!ubc-vision!ubc-cs!andrews "Good heavens, Miss Sakamoto, you're beautiful" This probably does not represent the views of the UBC Computer Science Department, or anyone else, for that matter.