Xref: utzoo sci.lang:1669 comp.ai:1145 Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!husc6!hao!ames!rutgers!mcnc!ece-csc!ncrcae!gollum!rolandi From: rolandi@gollum.Columbia.NCR.COM (rolandi) Newsgroups: sci.lang,comp.ai Subject: the role of biological models in ai Message-ID: <23@gollum.Columbia.NCR.COM> Date: 10 Dec 87 02:57:50 GMT References: Marty Brilliant Reply-To: rolandi@gollum.UUCP () Organization: NCR Advanced Systems, Columbia, SC Lines: 39 Keywords: models, purpose of ai Marty! Sorry about our previous misunderstanding. But regarding your reply ... > You know perfectly well that, as a technology > matures, it stops modeling its techniques on "natural processors" and > develops artificial substitutes that were previously unknown. You > don't fly by flapping wings, your car doesn't propel itself with legs, > and your air conditioner sweats as a result of cooling, not the other > way around. We first learn from natural processors, and then we > progress by inventing artificial processors. You make a good point here but, in a way, your examples labor against the interest of your argument. According to some AI theorists, (see Schank, R.C., (1984) The Cognitive Computer. Reading, Mass.: Addison-Wesley) AI is "an investigation into human understanding through which we learn ...about the complexities of our own intelligence." Thus, at least for some AI researchers, the automation of intelligent behavior is secondary to the expansion and formalization of our self-understanding. This is assumed to be the result of creating computational "accounts" of (typically intellectual) behavior. Researchers write programs which display the performance characteristics of humans within some given domain. The efficacy of a program is a function of the similarity of its performance to the human performance after which it was modeled. Thus AI programs are (often) created in order to "explain" the processes that they model. Although one of your examples provides an instance of a machine that employs principles derived from studying natural flight, (airplanes) I don't think many people would argue that the airplane was invented in order to "explain" flight. Of your other examples, I do not think that the workings of an automobile have ever been thought to provide insights into the nature of human locomotion. Nor do I believe that the "sweat" of an air conditioner is in any meaningful way related to perspiration in humans. -w.rolandi ncrcae!gollum!rolandi Look Boss, DisClaim! DisClaim!