Lecture � MIT MAS962 computational semantics

Greg Detre

Tuesday, October 22, 2002

 

 

AT&T � closest to deployed Turing test

 

Presentation � Gorniak on Brooks (1987)

Push: 180deg turn since then

living machines � they fool people, but they�re missing something

is there really no representation?

you could say that the representation is how they�ve designed the system to behave given the state of the world

loops � it would see the coke can, go up to the table, the can would be occluded by the edge of the desk, step back, see the can�

Deb: Smith�s excruciating detail zooming in on the distinction between subject/object and representation

definition of representation: manipulability

but epiphenomena are one way of manipulating �

decomposition by behaviour vs by function

Tom: adding a new layer is as arbitrary as a perception/reasoning divide

there�s no clean API between layers � the layers don�t really work on their own - subsumption

3 ways of carving up the different modules: function behaviour complexity

his robots are very hard-wired:

flies: 5 layer NNs

people: do we learn to crawl? babies in casts for their early months still learn to walk at about the same time

can�t have language without symbols

does Cog fit in with this paradigm?

Puma: 2 ton industrial robot with a 50 pound payload � we can carry much more than that by not fighting against the world � we don�t try to model the motion of a pendulum, so much as react to it

counterfactuals

how can a robot that doesn�t have any representations dream?

Deb sees this paper as taking an extreme view to shift the world towards the intermediate where you want to be

outsourcing the semantics � there are some aspects of meaning or whatever that you don�t internalise, perhaps because some things are too complicated � perhaps you�re better off just reacting or calibrating with the world

Putnam: �meaning ain�t in the head�

 

 

 

Questions