Judith, Jack, all,
Three interjections from an eavesdropper -
Rosen modeling can maybe help inform computing, as well as vice versa. Can we make a computing platform that is lifelike in its materials and energy use, that does its own metabolism and repair? Like an ecosystem it would need to 1) run on renewable energy and 2) run on recycling materials processes. Can we design and build computing that "takes on a life of its own"?
Something somewhere below gave me a laugh, like a phrase to use as silly curse or invective - Oh go model yourself!
Lastly, I started as electrical engineer and converted to ecologist. I see life's hardware and software and their integrality as far superior to human works, but also a good source of role models and design ideas we can learn from and borrow from. Forests show the opposite of the Tragedy of the Commons, they do what I call the Bounty of the Commons. How do they do that?!?!?! They build/accumulate/improve water, carbon, nitrogen, etc. as they operate. Inspiring...
Some thoughts...
DF
Judith Rosen wrote:
*Jack Park wrote: *You (Judith) and others can take the time to wax thoughtful on the notion of a cookbook, or, you can get on with tossing ideas into the ring. ****
*That's a tad unfair, it seems to me. Perhaps you missed this part of my post:*
> *So I keep throwing various insights out there, hoping something will
> prove useful and can be plugged into your much larger cache of knowledge
> and help you along in your efforts.*
*Judith*
**
----- Original Message -----
*From:* Jack Park <mailto:***>
*To:* *** <mailto:***>
*Sent:* Monday, January 31, 2005 10:41 PM
*Subject:* Re: [ROSEN] Jack's Rosennean Cookbook idea...
As Richard Hamming famously said: "The purpose of computing is insight,
not numbers."
Cast in that light, just about anything a computer can do to
illuminate,
if only in some small way, candidate pathways to enlightnement in the
eyes of modelers, problem solvers, then, let it be said that a benefit
is accrued. If such modelers, problem solvers are looking for insight
into the nature and solution to the vast array of complex and urgent
problems facing humanity, then, even better.
We can sit here and wax poetic or even religious that computers can or
cannot do this or that. In the end, who really gives a shit? Some of us
are bucking for a dissertation defense, some of us are trying to
collect
or fulfill a payroll, and some of us really care about those complex
and
urgent problems. You (Judith) and others can take the time to wax
thoughtful on the notion of a cookbook, or, you can get on with tossing
ideas into the ring. I am happy to see a relational analysis of the
problem space posed just by the notion of a cookbook, itself an
intended
relational model of a perceived discipline. The analysis sketched
below,
itself, is a useful start.
People, such as Jerry will argue, and correctly so, that we cannot
share
knowledge. Information is the currency of human discourse. Gordon Pask,
who's entailment meshes are as close to a relational space as any I've
seen, argued that we each hold, in our minds, models of those with whom
we engage in social intercourse. Without such models, the
information we
encode in our conversations would likely be just so much noise. My
model
of my son, when he was 3, suggested that an indepth dialog on technical
analysis of IBM's ticker just wouldn't make much sense to him. These
days, he might surprise me. So, we can share information, and given
that
our internal models of our listeners allow us to perform a kind of "pre
interpretation" such that we emit only those ideas that we either think
to be meaningful--as in, capable of being interpreted in a way that
meaning was made in the mind of our listener, or that we think will
provoke a debate (or titilate, when the game is humor). Indeed, Marvin
Minsky thinks that humor is all about expectation failure.
And, expectation failure is what anticipatory systems are all about,
and
that is what my qualitative reasoner uses as a modeling trick to
provoke
thoughts in the human in the loop. Thus, I would argue that even the
simplest, purely syntactic, symbolic model holds forth the opportunity
to illuminate things, ideas, concepts, events which the user may not
have seen. In my experience with my program, crystalographers who were
asked to encode their domain knowledge into the process rules of my
system all commented that just the process of "teaching" my program
opened their eyes to things they hadn't thought about before. You don't
have to solve a problem to discover something; you just need a means by
which you can hold-forth a dialog within your own mind as you formulate
some story for some other entity to hear (whatever hearing entails).
Following a cookbook is just one way to learn something. Writing the
cookbook is another.
We, as humans, are extremely fond of telling each other what is or is
not possible. I submit that that behavior is part of the problem. Go
model that.
Jack
Judith Rosen wrote:
> *I continue to mull over these ideas...*
> **
> *What limits me the most is a clear understanding of what computer
> programming can realistically encode. I use computers a lot, and
I have
> amassed a large cache of mostly intuition-based understanding, using
> what experts like Jack and others have said as a form of "parameter
> checking".... but I have grave doubts that this is enough to
really help
> generate a "Rosennean information sorting protocol" or something
along
> those lines... *
> **
> *So I keep throwing various insights out there, hoping something
will
> prove useful and can be plugged into your much larger cache of
knowledge
> and help you along in your efforts.*
> **
> *The problems Jack is facing, as I perceive them, are:*
> *1.) Humans are complex systems.*
> *2.) Human conscious minds are a complex system/component of the
average
> human being.*
> *3.) Language is a complex system in its own right, and is also
> a component of the human conscious mind.*
> *4.) There is a relation between the human mind and language
which is
> also complex.*
> *5.) /Semantics/ are indispensable _within_ the complex system
that is
> "language"-- as is /Context /(there is a crucial relation there,
between
> those two aspects).*
> *6.) Semantics and context are also indispensable in the complex
> relation between human minds and language.*
> *7.) Computers are finite and are, therefore, incapable of fully
> modeling any complex system.*
> **
> *The good news, on the other hand, is:*
> *1.) This is intended to be an interactive tool and therefore its
finite
> incompleteness is not a fatal limitation: The human mind and human
> relational ability will come along "for free" in any actual use
of this
> interactive tool. (In other words; it's meant to be part of a larger
> chimerical system of human-and-computer-and-interactive-tool.)*
> *2.) Reductional models of complex systems can be incredibly
useful and,
> in fact, organisms naturally incorporate the formation and
functional
> use of such reductions within themselves in the natural world (i.e.;
> Anticipatory Systems) to great effect, all the time.*
> *3.) It should be possible to figure out which aspects of the
complex
> systems being modeled can "safely" (safety being a relative
term!) be
> dispensed with and which cannot, such that the use of the models
doesn't
> generate intolerable "side effects".*
> *4.) It should also be possible to list which potential side effects
> would be intolerable (a term which I would tentatively define as
> meaning: limited/limiting to a negative degree /and/ unable to be
> compensated for via the interactive human mind using the program)
and
> which potential side effects are clearly tolerable (easily
compensated
> for).*
> **
> *What I can't answer, however, is whether the resulting
information will
> provide answers which can be translated into an information-sorting
> protocol via computer programming language rules.*
> **
> *Judith*
> **