It is very good to read your account as our 21st Century looks forward to 'strong' AI and quantum computation.
Roger Penrose in 'The Emperor's New Mind' (Edition, 1999) has an accessible account of Goedel's work and discusses the limitations of algorithms, especially with regard to strong AI. In Chapter 10, ('Where lies the Physics of Mind'), he reports, often entertainingly from his own experience on these intellectual frontlines, the different modes of thinking and their contact with the mathematical world.
There is a long history to all this. Recently I have been pointed to the work of Jeremy Naydler; 'In the Shadow of the Machine: The Prehistory of the Computer and the Evolution of Consciousness'. He relates the harnessing of logic both to the pursuit of truth and to utility in the emergence of technologies, particularly the use of binary division in the ‘logic machine’, e.g. the cam and other logical devices.
Sacasas over at The Convivial Society just now has a good essay that takes up again the thesis by Ivan Illich of the link between Western ‘reading / writing’ technologies and our conscious understanding. Illich’s ‘turning point’ is the brief period of Hugh of St Victor, (the Augustinian foundation in Paris), toward the end of 12thC. Western Europe was re-discovering skills from Classical time, eventually leading to recovery of some lost at the end of the Roman Empire. I have found I can read Illich’s text online: quote from his intro … “What had started as a study in the history of technology, ended up as a new insight into the history of the heart.” Goodness me!
'In the Vineyard the Text - A Commentary to Hugh’s Didascalicon.'
PS I tried inserting hyperlinks via Word, but they don't carry over. Google will get there if needed. Smile
Thanks. I haven't come across Naydler's work so will have to take a look. I'll be coming back to issues relating to AI quite often as I think there is a lot more to be said.
I have an intuition that has emerged for me over a longish period that the modern era has made a mistake about knowledge, probably exemplified in America, its education and contradictions.
Your approach seems different and ‘participates’ to an extent in previous intellectual endeavours, going over the same ground, but setting thought in the historical context? MacIntyre did something similar retracing the history of philosophical thought in 'After Virtue', which deals incidentally with the paradox inherent in utilitarian social science and what he calls the failure of the Enlightenment project. Naydler allows us to participate in the historical path / interplay between thought and the creation of machines.
I had some interesting participatory experience during a (barely) 'scientific career' which I still mull over. The ‘unknowns’ ballooned. FWIW these discussions bring to mind my latest imagining of the difference and interplay between human thought and mechanised thought. I try to imagine the history of thought back to the evolutionary past. My guess is that being built of the same stuff and its evolution, if we can call it that, we are party with a universe that we do not know, perhaps cannot know, even though this is us every day and night. With luck we participate with the unknowns and merrily call it a life. 'Creation' we might name it. Machines seem a secondary creation of thought, and their digital versions despite the logic to lack the rather larger unknowns we unwittingly rely on … anyway, personal note, forgive the musing; I’m stuck on the sofa having for the first time in my life done something to my back.
HK
It is very good to read your account as our 21st Century looks forward to 'strong' AI and quantum computation.
Roger Penrose in 'The Emperor's New Mind' (Edition, 1999) has an accessible account of Goedel's work and discusses the limitations of algorithms, especially with regard to strong AI. In Chapter 10, ('Where lies the Physics of Mind'), he reports, often entertainingly from his own experience on these intellectual frontlines, the different modes of thinking and their contact with the mathematical world.
There is a long history to all this. Recently I have been pointed to the work of Jeremy Naydler; 'In the Shadow of the Machine: The Prehistory of the Computer and the Evolution of Consciousness'. He relates the harnessing of logic both to the pursuit of truth and to utility in the emergence of technologies, particularly the use of binary division in the ‘logic machine’, e.g. the cam and other logical devices.
Sacasas over at The Convivial Society just now has a good essay that takes up again the thesis by Ivan Illich of the link between Western ‘reading / writing’ technologies and our conscious understanding. Illich’s ‘turning point’ is the brief period of Hugh of St Victor, (the Augustinian foundation in Paris), toward the end of 12thC. Western Europe was re-discovering skills from Classical time, eventually leading to recovery of some lost at the end of the Roman Empire. I have found I can read Illich’s text online: quote from his intro … “What had started as a study in the history of technology, ended up as a new insight into the history of the heart.” Goodness me!
'In the Vineyard the Text - A Commentary to Hugh’s Didascalicon.'
PS I tried inserting hyperlinks via Word, but they don't carry over. Google will get there if needed. Smile
Thanks. I haven't come across Naydler's work so will have to take a look. I'll be coming back to issues relating to AI quite often as I think there is a lot more to be said.
I look forward to reading your further work.
I have an intuition that has emerged for me over a longish period that the modern era has made a mistake about knowledge, probably exemplified in America, its education and contradictions.
Your approach seems different and ‘participates’ to an extent in previous intellectual endeavours, going over the same ground, but setting thought in the historical context? MacIntyre did something similar retracing the history of philosophical thought in 'After Virtue', which deals incidentally with the paradox inherent in utilitarian social science and what he calls the failure of the Enlightenment project. Naydler allows us to participate in the historical path / interplay between thought and the creation of machines.
I had some interesting participatory experience during a (barely) 'scientific career' which I still mull over. The ‘unknowns’ ballooned. FWIW these discussions bring to mind my latest imagining of the difference and interplay between human thought and mechanised thought. I try to imagine the history of thought back to the evolutionary past. My guess is that being built of the same stuff and its evolution, if we can call it that, we are party with a universe that we do not know, perhaps cannot know, even though this is us every day and night. With luck we participate with the unknowns and merrily call it a life. 'Creation' we might name it. Machines seem a secondary creation of thought, and their digital versions despite the logic to lack the rather larger unknowns we unwittingly rely on … anyway, personal note, forgive the musing; I’m stuck on the sofa having for the first time in my life done something to my back.