From: Colin Hales (colin@versalog.com.au)
Date: Thu Apr 11 2002 - 18:49:33 MDT
>
> Sigh. Never mind that science is firmly based on certain
> philosophical near-axioms and conclusions. Does anyone taking
> the above position know enough about philosophy to understand
> that making statements about what constitutes knowledge, what
> sorts of knowledge are possible in what conditions, and how to
> verify knowledge ARE philosophical positions?
>
> Or are our geeky blinders on way too tight?
>
> - samantha
>
Do not despair in my case, Samantha. I chew, chisel , gnaw through all
manner of philosopher-speak as best I can. There are gems buried between all
the retentive categorisations. An example: "Meaning and Representation" by
Cummins. Up to his armpits in categorisations until about 3/4 of the way
through. At least Cummins managed to make it only a couple of hundred pages.
I find it really hard to adopt the categorisations, follow the reasoning in
real/reasonable-time and then re-code it from my own perspective so that it
maps onto my AI ideas. I'm just a bit thick I suppose. The thing is I could
get there with a <10 pages of nice diagrams. It's when I realise this fact
that I get a bit edgy.
What I also find I am getting better at is real-time-skim-to-juicy-bits and
see if the categorisations and historical thought calibrations I skimmed get
in the way. I also try to get the work recommended in some way. Because I
value my time so highly, I get really agro when I follow tantalising tidbit
into the waffle zone. Unfortunately there seems to be far more waffle than
juicy bits, which is what seems to irritate more than just me, if you go by
the critical zeal in the thread.
speaking of waffle....I hope I haven't wasted your time waffling you to this
point.
cheers
Colin
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