Connectionists: How the brain works

[Balázs Kégl]

> While it is at least worth considering whether the arm from fin argument applies to the nervous system, because we don’t understand how the brain works, we can’t really answer the question whether there is some simpler version that would have worked just as well.  Accordingly, as with the radio analogy, in principle, asking whether a simpler version would work as well, depends on first figuring it out how the actual system works.  As I have said, abstract models are less likely to be helpful there, because they don’t directly address the components. 

Wouldn’t the airplane/bird analogy work here? Does being able to design an airplane help understanding how birds fly? I think it does. Evolution didn’t invent the wheel, so it had to go in a complex (and not necessarily very efficient) way to “design” locomotion, which means that airplane engines don’t really explain how birds propel themselves. On the other hand, both have wings, and controlling the flying devices looks pretty similar in the two cases. In the same way, if some artificial network can reproduce intelligent traits, we might be able to guide what we’re looking for in the brain (a model, whose necessity we agree on). Of course, scientific process rarely works in this way, but it’s because you need computers for this kind of “experimentation”, and computers are quite new.

Balázs


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Balazs Kegl
Research Scientist (DR2)
Linear Accelerator Laboratory
CNRS / University of Paris Sud
http://users.web.lal.in2p3.fr/kegl