tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4683970826895755480.post4740757448145087741..comments2024-03-28T21:32:26.550+00:00Comments on Bruce Charlton's Notions: Man or woman: Thinking in Categories or thinking of BeingsBruce Charltonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09615189090601688535noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4683970826895755480.post-4612162413941727252018-11-16T20:17:44.161+00:002018-11-16T20:17:44.161+00:00Well, the origins of language are less the problem...Well, the origins of language are less the problem than the essential nature of symbolic communication and the limits of boolean logic.<br /><br />Using proper names rather than categorical nouns doesn't solve the problem (besides, you'd also have to use proper names to distinguish each event, and good luck with that). After all, "No man ever steps in the same river twice", the river, and the man, have both changed in the interim.<br /><br />Any serious attempt to think about reality (or even our limited perception of it) so specifically and particularly destroys the possibility of describing it in language...<i>any</i> language. We must content ourselves with saying that it is "indescribable, ineffable, beyond mere language."<br /><br />This is the long-standing central problem of AI, we sorta know how to make a machine "talk" (though they still don't do so particularly well), but how do you get it to carry on <i>consciousness</i>? Nobody knows, because consciousness is inexplicable, precisely because it cannot be limited to symbolic logical manipulation at all.Chiu ChunLinghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03519192610708043962noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4683970826895755480.post-45740341821649980562018-11-16T14:08:14.892+00:002018-11-16T14:08:14.892+00:00@A - "Is it true to say that all categories a...@A - "Is it true to say that all categories and languages violate the logical law of identity?"<br /><br />That's what I think - therefore, I would regard CCL's account of the origins of language as an example of the problem I am trying to critique. Bruce Charltonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09615189090601688535noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4683970826895755480.post-2931311742846078772018-11-16T12:36:00.807+00:002018-11-16T12:36:00.807+00:00Is it true to say that all categories and language...Is it true to say that all categories and languages violate the logical law of identity? <br /><br />If so, than a truly divine language would have no nouns, but use the true given names for every unique being that exists, no?<br /><br />I suppose this is why visions and expansions of consciousness cannot be truly communicated with others.Epimetheushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00544393899043550896noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4683970826895755480.post-21150860216522317932018-11-15T16:21:10.176+00:002018-11-15T16:21:10.176+00:00While it is true that our actual experience of rea...While it is true that our actual experience of reality is made up of particular encounters with individual entities, language cannot be structured so as to reflect this without ceasing to be language. Language requires a common frame of reference, and this requires sorting things into categories that are likely to have some commonality with the experiences of others. Otherwise we can never reach the point of being able to communicate anything that is not already known by the direct experience of both the speaker and audience.<br /><br />This begins with names for particular people, objects, and actions. We learn to say "Mama" and "Papa" and that each sound elicits a reaction from an entity with which we have familiarity. Eventually, we can elicit particular desired responses by sounds associated with previous actions, and specify them further with named objects. But this requires (generally on the part of the parent) categorical interpretation because they do not share the same experience stream even if they are present for all of it.<br /><br />Thus our language must be categorical to function as language at all, despite our experience and consciousness being particular and unique. We must not forget that language is not consciousness, and consciousness is not language. Nor is it <i>possible</i> for either to be the other.Chiu ChunLinghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03519192610708043962noreply@blogger.com