a little more McLuhan (& maybe Pynchon)

[alice wellintown]

I stuck my own assertion into Pinker's book; I claim that computers do
not play chess and certainly can not defeat a grand master. A bunch of
very smart people use a computer to defeat a grand master who lays
without the use of one.

Pinker does use the computer chess player analogy to make his point
that as complex as so-called thinking machines seem to be, as
sophisticated as so-called computer languages seem to be, they are in
fact simple when we put them next to the real thinking and basic
language of a human infant. Out of the brains of babes!

 It took a lot of evolution to make that big rug-rat head and squeeze
it into the world. There were periods of rapid change, when mutations
multiplied and the fittest, those who had offspring, carried the
adaptive language faculty and passed it on (it may have been nearly
vesigal or not essential to the fittest who survived, accidental and
not a factor but present nonetheless).

On a related idea, The Neo-Evolutionists that McLuhan cites, like
Robert Redfield, are not determinsts, so free will. McLuhan, a
positive guy would be attracted to them. His Catholicism has the free
will puzzle solved. Pynchon too. We've known that certain spinal
reactions are without free will, like when we touch a hot stove and
the spine pulls our hand off it without consulting the brain. But are
all our decisions made without free will? I've worked with young
people for a long time. They simply don't think as much as adults do
before they act. This seems a reasonable argument for the abolishment
of the death penalty for anyone under the age of 25 or under the 100
IQ Bell apex. The actions of humans are rarely rational. We have to
work at thinking and our brains are designed to work by habit and take
short cuts around thinking. Today, we read that we need to teach
students to think, think critically. We can't do this. You can lead a
horse to water, but we can't force it to drink. On a mass scale, this
is the problem with our economy:

  “You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink.” You
can force money on the system in exchange for government bonds, its
close money substitute; but you can’t make the money circulate against
new goods and new jobs."
Samuelson, Paul Anthony; Economics (1948), p 354.




On Wed, Aug 31, 2011 at 7:28 AM, Paul Mackin <mackin.paul at verizon.net> wrote:
> On 8/30/2011 8:11 PM, alice wellintown wrote:
>>
>> In the same book by Pinker, _The Language Instinct_, in Chapter 7,
>> "Talking Heads", he tosses the robots in the trash and kicks the AI
>> enthusiasts to the curb. Robots can't do the smple tasks that infant
>> humans are born doing. BTW, computers can not play chess. He also
>> makes fun of the idea of animal languages. Animal and computer
>> languages like Pluto, not planets.
>
> The paradox is that the "simple tasks" turn out to be the very hardest to
> understand in physicalist terms.
>
> Defeating grand master Evgeny Vladimirov was by comparison duck soup.
>
> How do the little tikes do it?
>
> P.
>
>
>
>
>> On Tue, Aug 30, 2011 at 5:48 PM, Paul Mackin<mackin.paul at verizon.net>
>>  wrote:
>>>
>>> On 8/30/2011 5:05 PM, cfabel wrote:
>>>
>>> I’m not sure if this helps or just reveals my own misunderstanding of
>>> what’s
>>> going on here, but I believe there is quite a passel of research
>>> suggesting
>>> strongly that mental operations exist prior to the onset of language,
>>> conversation by gesture, and social interaction. So it seems not
>>> unreasonable to hypothesize, at least, that some of us “think” without
>>> words. But, language is not just significant symbols but syntax and
>>> syntax
>>> seems to be part of our bio-inheritance, part of our pre-social
>>> mind-brain
>>> (Chomsky’s “language faculty?”). So, syntax, probably, is neither learned
>>> nor constructed socially and this suggests a reversal of the model of
>>> symbolic interaction, mind, language, and the self. Bio-inheritance
>>> first,
>>> symbolic interaction follows, probably?
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> This sounds very relevant to Mark's question. The symbol consciousness
>>> seems
>>> to be kind of an overlay placed upon the real show going on in the neural
>>> networks.    AI theorists model both neural networks and symbol
>>> manipulation
>>> in order to provide a better understanding for the design of robots.
>>>
>>> Also there are the neuroscience findings (brain imaging) that support the
>>> idea that our nervous systems make decisions for us before we are even
>>> aware
>>> of them.  Throws into doubt so called "free will."
>>>
>>> P
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> C. F. Abel
>>>
>>> Chair
>>>
>>> Department of Government
>>>
>>> Stephen F. Austin State University
>>>
>>> Nacogdoches, Texas 75962
>>>
>>> (936) 468-3903
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> From:owner-pynchon-l at waste.org  [mailto:owner-pynchon-l at waste.org] On
>>> Behalf
>>> Of Mark Kohut
>>> Sent: Tuesday, August 30, 2011 3:27 PM
>>> To: David Morris
>>> Cc: alice wellintown; David Payne; Paul Mackin; pynchon -l
>>> Subject: Re: a little more McLuhan (&  maybe Pynchon)
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> This has been a fascinating, because more puzzling than usual, thread.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I do not know what I may be "mistaking" my word-thinking for, since I am
>>> just offering it as a phenomenon.
>>>
>>> I do not know if it comes from some learned or innate 'grammar".........
>>>
>>> Yes, I KNOW it slows me down --in reading anyway. (Although I have
>>> various
>>> speeds--as we all do?)
>>>
>>> How word-thinking is connected to my auditory sense, I do not know
>>> either,
>>> except that, as I wrote, it happens
>>>
>>> when I listen to TV, say, so that sense is involved. Happens (mostly)
>>> when I
>>> read in quiet. happens when I write.
>>>
>>> Sometimes when I 'think", I think.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> And, I am sure I 'think', experience much mentally, in other ways than in
>>> words as well. Not to even mention the Unconscious.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I just wondered who else is like me in this regard. What they think it
>>> might
>>> mean for our orientation in the world.
>>>
>>> And, for whom this may NOT be true.............and what that might mean
>>> for
>>> them...
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> And how societies might handle the dirfferences.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> From: David Morris<fqmorris at gmail.com>
>>> To: alice wellintown<alicewellintown at gmail.com>
>>> Cc: pynchon -l<pynchon-l at waste.org>
>>> Sent: Tuesday, August 30, 2011 2:57 PM
>>> Subject: Re: a little more McLuhan (&  maybe Pynchon)
>>>
>>> On Tue, Aug 30, 2011 at 10:34 AM, alice wellintown
>>> <alicewellintown at gmail.com>  wrote:
>>>>
>>>>  I think McLuhan would say that, even on a gray scale, black&  white are
>>>> qualitatively different......like literate vs. pre-literate even on a
>>>> gray
>>>> scale
>>>>
>>>> He would say this.
>>>
>>> And who wouldn't say this?  Without qualitative differences in a gray
>>> scale, no images could be seen.  But the point of a scale is minute
>>> differences.
>>>
>>>>> And young 'uns learn most languages as abstract marks on a page.
>>>>> English
>>>>> say.....
>>>>
>>>> This is false. First, humans don't learn language but are born with
>>>> language.
>>>
>>> Language versus literacy?  I think we've jumped a step here.
>>>
>>>>> The literate vs. pre-literate distinction is in anthropologists' work
>>>>> and
>>>>> is still used to the present....
>>>>
>>>> Like all technologies, printing brought positives and negatives. Surely
>>>> there are things that pre-literate cultures have kept or developed that
>>>> literate cultures have lost or neglected. We would all be better runners
>>>> if
>>>> we hadn't abandoned the cave and invented the wheel. But the health that
>>>> would come with our endurance would not give us longer or better lives.
>>>> We
>>>> would die quite young.
>>>
>>> AMEN!
>>>
>>> But would our shorter lives have been more rich inside?  (joke)
>>>
>>>>> No one has (yet) answered whether they think mostly in words....for
>>>>> example, I watch TV....I SEE the words they are speaking...mostly...not
>>>>> every, I'm sure....
>>>>
>>>> We think in grammar not words.
>>>
>>> I'd like to see more of this "We think in grammar not words" theory.
>>> If by this grammar you mean simple equations of logic revolving around
>>> desire, fear, etc, then I think I understand your statement.  These
>>> binaries are not our enemies (as GR might imply).  They are natural
>>> first perceptions that we need to see more finely with practiced
>>> observation.
>>>
>>> On another level, individual humans are often predisposed toward
>>> certain sensory inputs: visual and/or auditory primarily.  I am
>>> personally very visually oriented.  Maybe Mark mistakes his
>>> word-thinking from being primarily auditory.
>>>
>>> David Morris
>>>
>>>
>>>
>
>
>