Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!mcvax!ukc!strath-cs!glasgow!gilbert From: gilbert@cs.glasgow.ac.uk (Gilbert Cockton) Newsgroups: comp.ai Subject: Re: AI and Sociology Message-ID: <1301@crete.cs.glasgow.ac.uk> Date: 30 May 88 09:33:23 GMT References: <1033@cresswell.quintus.UUCP> Reply-To: gilbert@cs.glasgow.ac.uk (Gilbert Cockton) Organization: Comp Sci, Glasgow Univ, Scotland Lines: 69 Firstly, thanks very much to Richard O'Keefe for taking time to put together his posting. It is a very valuable contribution. One objection though: In article <1033@cresswell.quintus.UUCP> ok@quintus.UUCP (Richard A. O'Keefe) writes: >But of course AI does no such thing. It merely announces that >computational approaches to the understanding are part of _its_ territory, >and that non-computational approaches are not. This may be OK for Lakatos, but not for me. Potty as some of the ideas I've presented may seem, they are all well rehearsed elsewhere. It is quite improper to cut out a territory which deliberately ignores others. In this sense, psychology and sociology are guilty like AI, but not nearly so much, as they have territories rather than a territory. Still, the separation of sociology from psychology is regrettable, but areas like social psychology and cognitive sociology do bridge the two, as do applied areas such as education and management. Where are the bridges to "pure" AI? Answer that if you can. The place such arguments appear most are in curriculum theory (and also some political theory, especially Illich/"Tools for Conviviality" and democrats concerned about technical imperialism). The argument for an integrated approach to the humanities stems from the knowledge that academic disciplines will always adopt a narrow perspective, and that only a range of disciplines can properly address an issue. AI can be mulitidisciplinary, but it is, for me, unique in its insistence on a single paradigm which MUST distort the researcher's view of humanity, as well as the research consumer's view on a bad day. Indefensible. Some sociologists have been no better, and research here has also lost support as a result. I do not subscribe to the view that everything has nothing but a social explanation. Certainly the reason the soles stay on my shoes has nothing much to do with my social context. Many societies can control the quality of their shoe production, but vary on nearly everything else. Undoubtedly my mood states and my reasoning performance have a physiological basis as amenable to causal doctrines as my motor car. But I am part of a social context, and you cannot fully explain my behaviour without appeal to it. Again, I challenge AI's rejection of social criticisms of its paradigm. We become what we are through socialisation, not programming (although some teaching IS close to programming, especially in mathematics). Thus a machine can never become what we are, because it cannot experience socialisation in the same way as a human being. Thus a machine can never reason like us, as it can never absorb its model of reality in a proper social context. Again, there are well documented examples of the effect of social neglect on children. Machines will not suffer in the same way, as they only benefit from programming, and not all forms of human company. Anyone who thinks that programming is social interaction is really missing out on something (probably social interaction :-)) RECOMMENDED READING Jerome Bruner on MACOS (Man: A Course of Study), for the reasoning behind interdisciplinary education. Skinner's "Beyond Freedom and Dignity" and the collected essays in response to it, for an understanding of where behaviourism takes you ("pure" AI is neo-behaviourist, it's about little s-r modelling). P. Berger and T. Luckman's "Social Construction of Reality" and I. Goffman's "Presentation of Self in everyday life" for the social aspects of reality. Feigenbaum and McCorduck's "Fifth Generation" for why AI gets such a bad name (Apparently the US invented computers single handed, presumably while John Wayne was taking the Normandy beaches in the film :-)) -- Gilbert Cockton, Department of Computing Science, The University, Glasgow gilbert@uk.ac.glasgow.cs!ukc!glasgow!gilbert The proper object of the study of humanity is humans, not machines