Re: How much intelligence?
- From: curt@xxxxxxxx (Curt Welch)
- Date: 08 Apr 2006 02:37:59 GMT
"chadmaester" <chad.d.johnson@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
I know it's been a month, but...
I.e., the existence of associations of concepts represented in the
brain, and them being pulled into short-term memory?
If you want to understand how behaviorism explains complex human
behavior, you will have to drop silly notions like this.
Why do you say this is a silly notion? Are you denying that there are
physical connections in the brain - associations - that represent
concepts? Or are you saying that short-term memory does not interact
with long-term memory? What are you saying?
I'm not trying to be arrogant - I'm open. I just don't understand what
you're getting at.
What he's getting at is that the entire common language of mental concepts
is ill-suited for explaining or talking about behavior. So, the silly
notions you will have to stay away from when trying to understand behavior
include the words "concepts", "associations", and "memory" (long or short
term). Not to mention your use of "pulled into". Basically, everything
you said was a silly notion to a behaviorist.
Think of the problem you would have explaining modern science to someone
who's only grasp of the world was centered around the ideas of Gods being
responsible for everything they saw - the weather, disease, crops failing,
etc. When you tried to explain a little bit about how lightning was
created by the the build up of an electrical charge between the clouds and
the ground, the person you were talking to said something like, "Oh, so
Zeus is using this electricity to make lightning?". You might respond with
something like, "If you want to understand how science explains complex
natural phenomenon like lightning, you will have to drop silly notions like
that".
A behaviorist sees what you said as being just as silly as someone trying
to explain nature by making reference to Gods.
In order to correctly explain behavior, behaviorism has created a whole new
set of concepts and language to talk about behavior based on what can
actually be objectively studied. In order to understand what behaviorism
has discovered, you have to learn the language - and with it, an entire new
way of thinking about behavior. It's not a language and set of ideas that
are easily learned. It's a major paradigm shift away from how humans
normally talk about the behavior of humans. Few people have taken the time
to actually learn this new language and way of thinking - I've only
partially scratched the surface. It's common for people to reject it as
absurd before they actually understand it. Their reasons for rejecting it
however is the same type of reasons this guy from the past might reject
science - because it fails to include the Gods - which everyone knows for a
fact is an important part of nature. But in the case of behaviorism, the
God people believe in is intention and free will and when they learn enough
about behaviorism to see there is no intention and free will in it, they
reject it as being absurd.
Glen can't explain why it's silly, without first teaching you the entire
language of behaviorism and all the concepts behind it. And that's not
something that can be done in a few Usenet posts. This is why people like
John have never seen Glen explain why it's silly. There are no simple
answers other than, "your Gods are silly - you really should learn
behaviorism".
--
Curt Welch http://CurtWelch.Com/
curt@xxxxxxxx http://NewsReader.Com/
.
- Follow-Ups:
- Re: How much intelligence?
- From: chadmaester
- Re: How much intelligence?
- From: JGCASEY
- Re: How much intelligence?
- References:
- Re: How much intelligence?
- From: chadmaester
- Re: How much intelligence?
- Prev by Date: Re: Strong AI Thesis (No Chinese room, I promise)
- Next by Date: Re: How much intelligence?
- Previous by thread: Re: How much intelligence?
- Next by thread: Re: How much intelligence?
- Index(es):
Relevant Pages
|
