Martin Owen (t.m.owen@bangor.ac.uk)
Thu, 10 Dec 1998 21:25:17 +0000
Date: Thu, 10 Dec 1998 21:25:17 +0000 From: Martin Owen <t.m.owen@bangor.ac.uk> Subject: Re: [ifets] Technology and Brain
Psychologists constructed notions of long, medium and short term memory to
hypothesize and perform some experiments to undertand some phenomena. The
brain doesn't have a "long", "medium" and "short" term memory devices in
the meat machine, but they were handy constructs for that particular
community at the time.
The issue is that humans are more than meat machines. They live in a social
environment. Describing the levels of nitric oxide in the brain at any
given time tells us nothing about what a human knows ( and never will!). It
is only through action in the world does that happen, and thanks be, we
have evolved into language users. AI scientists make too great a claim for
their constructs ( unlike me!) .
This does not deny there will be excellent computers in the future. This
does not mean that devices which have been based on weak analogies of human
functioning are not useful. Clearly computers which are cpapable of voice
recognition or visual discrimination have a great future. Neural chips also
offer great potential. However models of humans they ain't... they just
haven't lived like humans ( and I think that that is what is important
about us).
Tom ( I think ) asks:
> Then what is an appropriate model through which to understand the needs of
> the user, either as a learner or an individual.
One is trying to conceive of the computer as a mediation system ( in the
sense described by Leont'ev) set in an environment of social interaction
that is "learning". I would refer the gentle reader again the the notion of
Person+ from D. Perkins in Soloman's "Distributed Cognitions" (neat ideas).
Martin
Martin Owen
T.M.Owen@bangor.ac.uk
Director, Project REM
School of Education Yr Ysgol Addysg
University of Wales, Bangor Prifysgol Cymru, Bangor
Normal Site Safle'r Normal
Holyhead Rd Ffordd Caergybi
Bangor Bangor
Gwynedd
LL57 2PX
Voice/Llais +44 1248 382 943
Fax/Ffacs +44 1248 38 36 40
URL: http://weblife.bangor.ac.uk/rem/rem.html
REM is a EC DGXIII Telematics Education and Training Project
------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Technology is nothing more or less than a natural phase of the creative
process which engaged man from the moment he forged his first tool and
began to transform the world for its humanization"
Paulo Freire : Cultural Action for Freedom
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
---------------------------------------------------------
Forum website: http://zeus.gmd.de/ifets/
Email address for sending message to everyone on the list ifets@gmd.de
Forum's contact person ifets-info@gmd.de
Join/Leave Digest or Normal List http://zeus.gmd.de/ifets/maillist.html
---------------------------------------------------------
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.0b3 on Thu 10 Dec 1998 - 22:38:15 MET