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From: gilbert@cs.glasgow.ac.uk (Gilbert Cockton)
Newsgroups: comp.ai,talk.philosophy.misc
Subject: Re: Artificial Intelligence and Intelligence
Message-ID: <1983@crete.cs.glasgow.ac.uk>
Date: 28 Nov 88 09:42:20 GMT
References: <484@soleil.UUCP> <1654@hp-sdd.HP.COM> <1908@crete.cs.glasgow.ac.uk> <1791@cadre.dsl.PITTSBURGH.EDU> <819@novavax.UUCP> <1976@crete.cs.glasgow.ac.uk> <1816@cadre.dsl.PITTSBURGH.EDU>
Reply-To: gilbert@cs.glasgow.ac.uk (Gilbert Cockton)
Organization: Comp Sci, Glasgow Univ, Scotland
Lines: 35

In article <1816@cadre.dsl.PITTSBURGH.EDU> geb@cadre.dsl.pittsburgh.edu (Gordon E. Banks) writes:
>it make a sound?  I think it is imaginable that there could be
>in this universe solitary entities that "think".
Not the same as intelligence.  You can think dumb things.

>AI will not convince except with results.
Wrong, and you misunderstand the problem of 'results' in human
science.   An experiment proves very little in psychology.  It is the
design and the generalisation which are crucial, and these can only proceed
by argument.

>Your not so subtle needling of Americans would seem less
>hypocritical if it originated in a country (and continent)

Before this gets out of hand, the reference to U.S. slavery was just
the best example I know of, due to the quality of the historical
sources.  I wasn't singling out America, and I apologise to anyone who
was (mistakenly) annoyed, either by my posting, or by believing this
misinterpretation.

As for cultural styles, I was only drawing attention to the
differences.  I was not trying to create division or claim supriority.
As for approaches to literacy, well there are differences here, and it
looks like at least one American takes gentle jokey references
to this the wrong way.  Still, this is an international net, and we
can't all tailor our style of writing to suit one culture.

>Is this some supernatural notion, or is
>it the result of evolution, or culture, or some other natural process?
Don't know, do you?  There is a whole range of experience which does
not seem to hav a mechanical basis.  Which behaviour is AI trying to
cover (and do say 'intelligent' behaviour, since this means nothing here)?
-- 
Gilbert Cockton, Department of Computing Science,  The University, Glasgow
	gilbert@uk.ac.glasgow.cs !ukc!glasgow!gilbert