Connectionists: Symbols

[Rothganger, Fredrick]

Danny Silver said: "Symbols are external communication tools used between intelligent agents ..."

+1 for this point of view, along with the rest of the elaboration in his message.

My own view is that living systems are inherently cybernetic systems (in the original Norbert Wiener sense). They communicate both internally and externally to achieve their life processes (autopoiesis, as defined by Maturana & Varela). Their control processes are inherently dynamic rather than episodic, and they adjust their dynamics to remain in homeostasis (learning, per W. Ross Ashby).

Given these premises, symbols are physical events with prearranged effects on the recipient. Their purpose is to modify the behavior of the recipient.

In humans, the lowest level symbols are (roughly) phonemes. We have a limited set of O(100) phonemes which get arranged into a much larger set of "words". (Here it's worth mentioning formal language theory.) Unlike a lot of natural examples of symbols, words and grammar are something that human agents actively negotiate with each other. We create language. Part of that negotiation is to associate words with specific objects, actions or other "concepts". This requires grounding in a human body in the real world.

Finally, note that humans use a natural "folk" logic to interpret language (see "The Psychology of Proof" by Lance Rips). Grammar and logic are closely related mechanisms for structuring symbolic communication.

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