Brains, Knowledge, And Subjective Quantification...et Al

[Guest end3]

I am not sure what a model really is in this context, but it seems like one might combine the consensus of several models to form a truth?

 

Could you not use a machine to stop the prejudice of the reported outcome? The funny thing, even if the damn thing pointed to, by multiple models inputted by the human, a certain answer, I think we would still have a hard time believing the machine if we didn't "feel" it was correct.

 

So if the machine and the human were in agreement, and multiple humans were in agreement with multiple machines, then can we call subjective objective?

 

Would someone please list different models as I am "not worthy".

 

I would assume math, sensory,....

 

If I have already made a complete ass of myself, a nominal "please hush" will suffice.

[Guest end3]

You fuck with my brain? I fuck with yours. :-) Let I quote Perlovsky from his book Modeling Field Theory, a real pearl: \\\"Mathematical, psychological, and philosophical considerations suggest that the mind does not simply react to sensory data by acting out in the outer world. Complex internal representations (models) are utilized in order to understand the world: to recognize objects, their relationships, and possible interactions with them. Knowledge is represented by internal models. Acting out in the world is often very indirectly related to sensory stimuli, and the internal model often takes on a \\\"life\\\" of its own.

 

Why, why would your body and brain do anything other than form models to survive? And he said often, so modeling by sensory input is outdated when it comes to humanity?

 

 

Knowledge, or a good correspondence between the model and the world, is so important there have to very basic biological mechanisms driving toward regular or even constant improvements of this model.

 

So biology prevails....?

 

 

So, I have two answers.

 

1.) Your brain is using very smart methods to make sense of the world and to place new facts in a coherent framework. It is perhaps not called the \\\"scientific method\\\" but it will be hard to believe things that do not make sense for yourself. :-) If you do not feel comfortable with a certain theory, say that quantum mechanics is employed by the brain, or that every element has in some way a soul, than it probably doesn\\\'t resonate with your internal models that you build up after a long life learning. And the cool thing about awareness of this type of matter, a type of self-awareness, is that you can put yourself on purpose in environments where what will you experience will be most conflicting with what you believe on the moment. That is, if you feel that there is some understanding possible in the end.

 

2.) Your brain can be understood by scientific methods. I actually didn\\\'t think you meant it this way, but I want to say it anyway. There are different levels of consciousness. What I would like to build for the next five years are robots that have peripheral and sensorimotor awareness. I use scientific methods for that. Growing neural networks with certain regular properties by so-called gene regulatory networks, extracted from genomes that are under mutational pressure. I can regrow a neural network if necessary and test certain hypotheses about which type of neural networks are able to generate which type of behaviour, about over how many generations on average a certain neural network evolves, etc. I hope I can describe some constraints over 5 year, which define what the preconditions are to create beings with the types of awareness I stipulated.

 

I have only been trying to develop a new type of biodegradable seed starting pot.....I feel inadequate.

 

That is awesome...seems as though if you could take many by many methods and if they all point to certainties here, or there, then that would be "way cool".

 

How far have people gone with this type of reasearch?

 

I assume mathmatical modeling yields some unusual answers?

[RankStranger]

So when we now ask, “What is there or what exists?” we can say with certainty “We are; we exist.”

 

I'm not so sure about that. It's an assumption that I have no choice but to operate on... but I'm not entirely convinced that it's true.

[Legion]

So when we now ask, “What is there or what exists?” we can say with certainty “We are; we exist.”

I'm not so sure about that. It's an assumption that I have no choice but to operate on... but I'm not entirely convinced that it's true.

Belated happy birthday Iskerbibel.

 

Why do you doubt your own existence?

[Saviourmachine]

I can see your point Saviourmachine and I have heard others express a similar sentiment. But I am thinking that models must come in different forms and arise in different domains. You seem to be speaking about how the brain models visual stimuli. But there are models that arise entirely within mathematics. For instance, I believe that geometry can be modeled via Cartesian coordinates. I think these mathematical models shed light on what models are in general.

Heterogeneity in models is essential, my sentiment originates from the primarily mathematical way of describing real-world phenomena. To explain myself: some people say that something is only understood if someone can predict what it is going to do (via a mathematical analysis or other mainly reductionist means). I say that something is already fairly understood if it can be build. This is from an engineering point of view and a black sheep in science.

 

Another point: a description of a system is not the system itself. This is not a merely semiotic fact, it has several consequences. Levels as defined by Mahr become not independent layers. There is not some meta-OSI layer as how the internet is structured with layers with each independent reponsibilities. It is an intertwined mix of tradeoffs across layers. I will give two examples.

 

1.) Strong AI coined by Searle - he is not that stupid as opponents sometimes depict him! - says that AI can be build upon whatever underlying structure. Searle says that it may well be that there are some properties of the biological brain that are essential to create intelligence. Perlovsky goes to great lengths to describe a mathematical theory that accounts for adaptability and fuzziness way beyond anything described before. However, IMHO this is all relatively in vain if he does not account for simple physical constraints, like the costs of wiring. The longer the wires in electronics, the more power it costs to use it. That is why FPAA (analog electronics, not digital!) has the promise to build processing structures that approach the brain energy versus computational power ratio. Memory and processor are distributed together and do not have a so-called Von Neumann bottleneck between them: a large bus over which all signals have to travel. The implementation level is of extreme importance, and to abstract from it, as in mathematical models is so easily done, is a great danger. This is almost from a philosophical point of view, but it may set back science a few decades if this is not recognized as a potential pitfall;

2.) Wireless Sensor Networks [WSN] might use energy-saving protocols, in which on the so-called MAC layer (media access layer, which decides which node comes when) define algorithms that save energy by listening simultaneously. For example like some Eastern type of fireflies lit entire river banks because they synchronize their flashing by adjusting the moment on which they flash themselves, by looking at their neighbours. In this sense the nodes of a WSN might become silent for most of the time and be active to communicate on regular intervals to save energy. This is all very cool and beautiful, but on an application level, the network might even have higher-level knowledge that can be used. For example if I use a WSN that is able to detect movements in a building for the purpose of detecting intruders, the network may learn that it is unnecessary to do its job during daytime. It will be told by an operator that all the movements it detects are legal anyway. There is no sense for the network to be online during the workday and all its nodes can be sleeping. This is energy saving on multiple levels and is seldomly applied because either the type of mathematics that is developed doesn't go into this type of problematics, or mathematics itself is not the appropriate tool to do so. The latter is a bold idea, but IMHO contemporary mathematics does miss some "qualia" indeed. It is not "touchable" enough.

 

I would like to see neural networks as the new type of mathematics. And in the end it is. Because your saying: "There are models that exist entirely within mathematics" is indeed in some way mathematicians look at the world. It is of course true in some sense, in the way that there are correlations in nature that really exist there, independent of the fact that there are human brains that understand it. (I am no solipsist, or better pretty apathic towards that viewpoint.) It is utter nonsense in another sense. Mathematical models have to be understood and even formulated by (mammalian) minds. It's origin is hence a model in the neuroscientific sense I described before. It resonates with the patterns formed in the brain of a mathematician. The brain is a magic pattern recognition device and I am proud I have one.

 

This is longwinded, I hope I was able to explain what my own mind makes of it.

[Saviourmachine]

Hey end3! Perlovsky says "often" because sometimes the link between sensors and the state of the world is direct. But most often it is not. It is about "direct" versus "indirect". A human will form models (create indirect links) and is hence included in this paragraph, not excluded.

 

The type of research I describe will become ubiqitous, but it is far from that now. The more people join, the farther it will go. It is currently in its infancy. Really, nothing interesting has been build yet! That's why I am so vehemently opposing the mathematical model as our saviour. Using neural networks on robots, it is only done on a small scale, few people, small networks, old-fashioned networks (not properly coping with time), not within an evolutionary paradigm, not within a developmental paradigm, etc. etc. I am not fine with people abstracting from the brain architecture at will. Why not include mechanisms, instead of excluding them beforehand because we don't understand them yet? A robotic platform with the richness of levels (genes, proteins, cells, 3D space, neurons) as in biology does not exist! We are too afraid to copy from biology! I have a strong physical intuition that by leaving out those levels, we miss certain fundamental so-called non-linear characteristics, but that goes to far for now (it has to do with my previous post about cross-layer tradeoffs).

 

I may try to explain my intuition very briefly. Delays between neurons might be needed to recruit neurons for multiple patterns (so-called polysynchronous groups by Izhikevich); recurrency, wires that go back to previous neurons, might be needed for memory; spikes, explosive activity of a neuron instead of averaging incoming ion currents, might be needed for energy reasons; 3D structure might be needed to generate networks with spatial characteristics that preserve correlations received from sensory organs (light detectors in your eye close together tell something related to each other); gene regulatory networks might be needed to create neural networks that obey certain symmetric constraints (the brain is highly regular and modular). So, I have reasons to suggest the necessity of all those aspects, but it's still intuition. I have no mathematical proofs.

 

There is no mathematical proof that tells us that doing gene-manipulation directly from our brains, will put us on an evolutionary dead-end. It is not invented by nature for whatever reason. I use nature as my guide. I will not try mathematical equivalent approaches. They might be equivalent for now, until they discover that they "forgot" some physical limitation. I can give one example. There exist so-called scale-free networks. In theory they are scale-free indeed, in practice there is a limit to network size, and it is only scale-free to some degree. In practice I encounter such limitations always. I prefer to work using my physical intuition. If necessary I am gonna advance this field myself. You have no idea how people like to stick to old engineering practice. Evolutionary neuroroboticists, unite!

[Legion]

Well Saviourmachine, you certainly seem knowledgeable. But I hope you are not spinning your wheels in vain. I used to be very interested in AI. I thought robotics was a promising path because I felt that intelligence had to be embodied in some sense. I also thought neural networks were the way to go. And I was convinced that given the proper software a computer could be made to think. But I have come to doubt that.

 

What if it turns out that life is a prerequisite for mind? And what if it turns out that machines, including computers, have a fundamentally different organization than organisms, and that this difference precludes them from manifesting a mind?

[Ouroboros]

What if it turns out that life is a prerequisite for mind? And what if it turns out that machines, including computers, have a fundamentally different organization than organisms, and that this difference precludes them from manifesting a mind?

Then change the organization of the computer.

 

---

 

Originally "computer" was a word which mean a person who was skilled in doing mathematical tables, and not a machine. So the word computer did actually refer to human beings once.

 

Then Babbage used it for his analytical machine, which was made from cog-wheels.

 

Then it was used for ENIAN using ray-tubes.

 

Then it was used for main-frames.

 

Then it was used for Personal Computers.

 

Then it was used for anything that plugs in a pseudo-intelligence in cars, TVs, cellphones, ...

 

Then, 20 years from now, it will be the word used for devices which can make assumptions about the future, and predict market trends, finance, and political moves.

 

Then it will be the name for devices which takes over jobs we can't conceive today that they could.

 

Then you have the singularity emerging human life with those machines, and we become cyborgs. No one will be able to make a distinction between man and machine.

 

---

 

If you read SMs post earlier, that they are actually putting together "machines" using real neurons. If we can't call them "computers" because "computers" by definition can't be thinking, then what do you want to call them?

[Guest end3]

Well, three things....SM, thank you for trying to make it palitable, palpable....whatever the correct word might be (understandable). I won't throw in the "it's too complicated for me" towel yet.....but almost put it on that level.....personally, I think it will be a few years down the road, but I didn't know there were adventurers out there like you that don't own a white towel. Cool.

 

Legion, I tend to agree with both sides here, but more strongly agree with a definition of life that is distinguishable by some Means(capital M), although will readily admit I don't recognize the mechanism......just my humble opinion.

 

Hans, your still a knowledge seeking Swede...................just kidding......thanks for participating

[Ouroboros]

End3, it was (and is) a good topic.

[Guest end3]

End3, it was (and is) a good topic.

 

 

Thanks, it is just frustrating when I am impatient. Trying to acquire understanding one post at a time is too slow for comfort. I would more prefer a conversation to at least put me in the ballpark with general theories to this answering this type question.

 

When y'all talk modeling, I am thinking in my head a computer being able to recognize time and again a "thing" by building a three dimensional model by a binary process. (that is how little I understand about this). I also am thinking that y'all are talking about merging math, physics and chemistry to form perhaps a model that will have some agreement.

 

Questions that enter my mind are, can you program a computer to look for connectivity?

 

I will still accept a "shut up End" if need be....

 

I don't mean to burden folks with remedial stuff, but that is where I am at....

[Legion]

End I think the question, “What is a model?” is an excellent question. Let me try to gather my thoughts together before I try to answer.

[Ouroboros]

Thanks, it is just frustrating when I am impatient. Trying to acquire understanding one post at a time is too slow for comfort. I would more prefer a conversation to at least put me in the ballpark with general theories to this answering this type question.

Just to let you know... I feel the same thing, a lot of times. Frustration is just the symptom of hunger for knowledge and understanding. You remember the "empty v full" debate. Well, your frustration is the "empty" feeling. You can sense that something is missing.

 

Questions that enter my mind are, can you program a computer to look for connectivity?

Yes and no. That was easy, wasn't it?

 

Lets say you were a computer only, responding to stimuli around you. Then think about that you are limited to only certain stimuli where ever you currently are. So you will not only act based on the patters you have in your brain, but you also will act according to the environment you are in. You are more than just you. You are also a cog within a larger context, which is your environment. So you are individually a "device", but you also are a "microcomputer" within a framework of other "microcomputers" and we all together creates an even larger "device." And you will act and react to your place within that "device." So are you really ever "just a ... anything?" Or should you rather see yourself as a part of the whole?

 

And this time I really don't feel like saying "shut up End," since your question is valid. What is knowledge? And how?

 

(And I'm leaving the "model" question to LR, )

[Guest end3]

As we "are" right now, seems like a place to start is to define the ratio of living to non-living of our own system and perhaps meditate on that?

 

I am not a rock, but there are rocks in my system. I don't know that it would be advantageous to seek an understanding of the larger system than the one we are residing. I know it is, but what for at this point.....for example if I knew how the earth interacts with the universe....I'm not sure that would benefit humanity immediately. Just a thought.

[Ouroboros]

As we "are" right now, seems like a place to start is to define the ratio of living to non-living of our own system and perhaps meditate on that?

 

I am not a rock, but there are rocks in my system. I don't know that it would be advantageous to seek an understanding of the larger system than the one we are residing. I know it is, but what for at this point.....for example if I knew how the earth interacts with the universe....I'm not sure that would benefit humanity immediately. Just a thought.

Yeah, you would probably not benefit from understanding it. Consider this: lets say your cells had some awareness, would they be capable of understanding you? Probably not. So if we would make up a larger "being" through our social interaction, we wouldn't necessarily understand the thoughts or language this social gestalt would have. If the internet became a thinking and aware "being" of some sorts, we wouldn't be able to understand it, unless it would (somehow) make contact with us. But then, how would we know it wasn't just a fake or a trick? Stanislav Lems book Solaris kind of gives the insight in how difficult it would be for us to understand a being more complicated than ourselves, and vice versa. We not only speak different languages, but the way we actually do speak would be completely different. If we met a being who spoke through telepathic images and we try to talk to them, and the images we get are confusing, mixed up, full of colors, and chaos, and we try to speak back using our vocal cords and they don't even have ears to hear it. Where and how can we meet on an equal level?

[Guest end3]

As we "are" right now, seems like a place to start is to define the ratio of living to non-living of our own system and perhaps meditate on that?

 

I am not a rock, but there are rocks in my system. I don't know that it would be advantageous to seek an understanding of the larger system than the one we are residing. I know it is, but what for at this point.....for example if I knew how the earth interacts with the universe....I'm not sure that would benefit humanity immediately. Just a thought.

Yeah, you would probably not benefit from understanding it. Consider this: lets say your cells had some awareness, would they be capable of understanding you? Probably not. So if we would make up a larger "being" through our social interaction, we wouldn't necessarily understand the thoughts or language this social gestalt would have. If the internet became a thinking and aware "being" of some sorts, we wouldn't be able to understand it, unless it would (somehow) make contact with us. But then, how would we know it wasn't just a fake or a trick? Stanislav Lems book Solaris kind of gives the insight in how difficult it would be for us to understand a being more complicated than ourselves, and vice versa. We not only speak different languages, but the way we actually do speak would be completely different. If we met a being who spoke through telepathic images and we try to talk to them, and the images we get are confusing, mixed up, full of colors, and chaos, and we try to speak back using our vocal cords and they don't even have ears to hear it. Where and how can we meet on an equal level?

 

Made me have the Rudolf, Burl Ives snowman quiver to describe the internet as "a step up, next generation humanity".

 

But let's say man is "programmed" from the original cells(stem cells?) upwards, that each layer is a function of the previous layer and somewhat limited environment. Are plants the same strategy? Aren't we assuming that environment to be relatively constant after the first level of the system? And I don't understand why the levels afterword would take on some vigorous new pattern after the original layer, or if they could even?

 

Just rambling thoughts.

 

Like it is easy, but seems as though there is an answer out there, but the research happens too slowly.

[Ouroboros]

Made me have the Rudolf, Burl Ives snowman quiver to describe the internet as "a step up, next generation humanity".

Not quite. It doesn't necessarily replace humanity, or even being the "next evolution" of humanity, but more of co-evolving and mutual co-operation. The internet needs us, like we would need the internet.

 

But let's say man is "programmed" from the original cells(stem cells?) upwards, that each layer is a function of the previous layer and somewhat limited environment. Are plants the same strategy? Aren't we assuming that environment to be relatively constant after the first level of the system? And I don't understand why the levels afterword would take on some vigorous new pattern after the original layer, or if they could even?

No, we're not "programmed" from the original cells. The cells, DNA, nerves, etc gives the engine, but experience makes most of the programming. Think of this, does a computer come with all the software you will eventually install? If you install a program you just bought, was it already installed, or did you install it? If the machine already was pre-programmed to do what that software would do, then there's no reason to install anything. I have built computer from bottom up. Even made my own boards once a long time ago. And the computer does not come with any programs. It only gives the potential to be programmed. Same with humans. We have the potential to learn, but we do not come pre-learned. And we can also have disabilities which makes it harder or impossible to learn certain things, and that's defined in our "hardware."

 

Even plants are shaped by their environment. If you have noticed, trees do not look the same, but yet similar. Two orange trees next to each other look alike, but have different branches, and shape. And it's because of wind, water, nutrients, ... Nature shapes it. Just as our social setting shapes us. And I know most Christians who criticize atheism or non-God worldviews try to put this on us that DNA is all that we are, but it's wrong, we are our experience. DNA is only the carrier of the bodily functions which encapsulates the experiences which makes us. So we're not only a bag of DNA. We are a bag of DNA which experience, grow, and develop in response to life.

[Guest end3]

I guess what I was thinking was more along the lines of assembled rather than "programmed" to be a recognizable human form, the hardware perhaps, and that happens to some degree of certainty within the constraints of the earthly environment. I think I understand your description of how we are unique within a framework of environment, but I would rather leave out the believer/non-believer stuff. (Once I see the bigger picture, then I will be able to tell you where you went wrong in your thought process regarding why God had to be there! )

 

So you are saying the programming is more a result of environment. I don't know that I disagree or even if we could tell. Seems our lack of knowledge about the past and also the future limits us to projecting only a guess. I also would assume that our best bet is to study the living processes today, but with that, the results are perhaps limited by the evolutionary "place" in which we are at. How does that register on the BS meter?

 

Also why I could accept knowledge as a cold beer, good food and resonably hot women...non-english speaking of course

[Legion]

End, thank you for asking this question. What is a model? In the effort to formulate a palatable answer for you I have learned some things too. And I should be quick to add that what I say here is only my take on it at the moment. Others might disagree with me and my concept of a model will likely change as I learn more.

 

A modeling relation is a relation between systems, as will see in greater detail. I believe we only know of two different kinds of systems: natural systems and formal systems. Some examples of natural systems are: trees, trucks, rocks, dogs, stars, swamps, and societies. Some examples of formal systems are: Euclidean geometry, calculus, set theory, category theory, and topology.

 

Two different natural systems can sometimes model each other. For instance in medicine, rat physiology is often used as a model for human physiology. And to some unspecified extent, we can learn about humans by studying rats. A modeling relation between natural systems is the basis of analogy. And we can say that humans and rats are analogous.

 

Two different formal systems can sometimes model each other, but we will not treat this case in detail here.

 

I believe what many scientists are interested in is the case where a formal system models a natural system. For instance, a physicist might have a model of the sun. And these days she is more than likely using differential equations (calculus) to do so. She knows that her formal system is a model of the sun because after 1) transcribing phenomena of the sun into propositions in her formalism via measurements and 2) drawing inferences according to her formalism and 3) producing predictions about the phenomena of the sun 4) her predictions are confirmed by observing how causality has acted on the sun.

 

In possessing a model we also possess a theory. Science is in the business of producing models. And just as all theories, understandings and analogies are partial, all models are limited.

 

I suppose that’s a decent opening salvo on the question, so I will stop there for the moment.

[RankStranger]

So when we now ask, “What is there or what exists?” we can say with certainty “We are; we exist.”

I'm not so sure about that. It's an assumption that I have no choice but to operate on... but I'm not entirely convinced that it's true.

Belated happy birthday Iskerbibel.

 

Why do you doubt your own existence?

 

Thanks.

 

I guess it'd be more accurate to say that I doubt that our concept of existence is anything close to an exact model. I'm not sure that it's even a good approximation. An example would be the fourth spatial dimension. We can't see it or even visualize it very well... but it's there alright. I think that means that our own model of existence compared to actual 4-dimensional existence is roughly analogous to a hypothetical 2-dimensional being trying to understand the 3-dimensional world that he lives in. He wouldn't really be up to the task, and I doubt that we are. There's an odd little book written in the late 1800's by Edwin Abbott Abbott that seems to have a cult following of sorts these days (somebody on this site recommended it a while back), and does a really good job of explaining this dilemma.

 

The more math and science classes I take, the more reasons I come across to doubt just how much we actually understand and how fully we can 'know' something.

[Guest end3]

Had a thought about this this morning....was thinking about models of humanity vs nature modeling. This is all surface level thinking so it's a FWIW... Human modeling seems to lean towards a "perfection" in many cases. i.e. in attractiveness, strength, marketing, purchasing, religion, etc. Why is it different for humanity and not nature. There is no benefit for the highest mountain. Is it a function of our ability to think and have evolved to bigger is better? Just some thoughts...

[chefranden]

Subjective quantification.....can you apply the scientific method to subjective? Maybe it is simple for your brain to bring this to a clever end, but it messes with my head. If you have 27 opinions that all agree, then is this the truth?

 

This is happening in Cognitive Science. It is a rather young science and methods as yet are crude, but I think that eventually it will be able to describe a category of brain states that can be said to be the experience of red. We already know that some people cannot experience red due to various defects in the apparatus which tells us that the experience of red requires a certain physical brain state.

[Legion]

Had a thought about this this morning....was thinking about models of humanity vs nature modeling. This is all surface level thinking so it's a FWIW... Human modeling seems to lean towards a "perfection" in many cases. i.e. in attractiveness, strength, marketing, purchasing, religion, etc. Why is it different for humanity and not nature. There is no benefit for the highest mountain. Is it a function of our ability to think and have evolved to bigger is better? Just some thoughts...

End I don’t know if this bears upon your question, but I’ll give it a shot.

 

What I’ve been told is that some people think that there exists a largest model of the universe. This would imply that all things could be understood in principle. But this would only be the case if we lived in a simple, mechanistic universe. But our universe is not simple; it’s complex. We still have the chicken and the egg. And we still have self-fulfilling prophecies.

 

I think it is both admirable and natural to try and increase our understanding to the fullest extent possible. But I strongly suspect that our universe is such that there will always remain much that we do not understand and have not yet modeled.