GRAEME SMITH                         email: grysmith@freenet.edmonton.ab.ca
YMCA Edmonton

Address has changed with little warning!
(I moved across the hall! :) )

Email will remain constant... at least for now.


On Sat, 13 Mar 1999, Wagner Lipnharski wrote:

> All the parallel and serial effects you said about the visual system are
> purely mechanical,...

What about the organization of the neurons into collectives called nerves
and back out into cortex tissue etc?

I think that there would be more useful work done, if we didn't fly in the
face of ALL the constants, but accepted that there were some that are at
the very least, somewhat restrictive, and WORK AROUND them.

Instead of fighting time.... Why not consider it a Co-linear system,
each step takes time, but the process can be seen across many such time
lines, and the end result happens sooner, the more of it that can be done
in parrallel.

I think of it a bit like one of those conforming tools, that is made up of
a whole bunch of pins, that are allowed to slide back and forth in a
frame. A little pressure, against an object, echoes the relief of the
surface of that object....

If we accept that each step takes time, but that the co-ordination between
the steps is not rigid, and can flex to some extent, we get something a
whole lot more useful, than either a straight serial processor, or a rigid
parrallel processor.

>
> I was talking purely about the image caption and recognition mechanism,
> that has nothing to do even with
> the interpretation of the image.  When you see a car crash photo with
> blood and other things, it is repulsive
> much before you recognize exactly what it is.

How do you know its repulsive, unless you recognize aspects of it, that
"REPULSE" you? I think you are using too large a granulation on this,
Neurons are much less powerful than you seem to presuppose. Hebbian neural
networks require two or more layers, simply to react at all, HH neurons
may have a second order effect but only are valid in "Tissue" like
simulations.

The "Neighborhood" effect is not nearly as intelligent as you make it out
to be.


> Think about the "limitations" is very difficult when we don't understand
> not even a little part of the system,

??? WE DON'T?

You mean we have spent centuries, trying to understand something, and
FAILED COMPLETELY??? (Not Likely)


> or not even "dream" about how to replicate it, but there are no limits,
> except in out rational way to think.

I don't much like the "Pholosophy" of "Rationality" myself...

I think the GREEKS did us a bit of a disservice, by attempting to define
"Right Thinking" as some function of logic. While it might seem, well-
"Illogical" to redefine logic, a less formal system, is indicated, at
least in a functional manner by the relative successes of comercial
versions of "Fuzzy Logic". Micro-Chip, seems to value this contribution.

However there is no reason to get... well, "Irrational" about it, (he he)
and throw all the babies out with the bathwater... Lets consider that
there might be good reasons for the "Constants" if only to act as place
holders in our theories.... ;)

>
> Serial steps make part of a universe that uses time for the cause/effect
> process, I am not talking about it, and we will never reach MDP or some
> mysteries of the brain or space warp, while thinking in serial steps.
>

??? Why not? after all, serial steps are what got us here in the first
place, why can't it continue to carry us on? Remember the COLLECTIVE of
all scientists working on all the questions in the universe
simultaneously, is a good parrallel processor, complete with checks and
ballances, like this discussion.


> Some time ago I said here that the word "impossible" need to be
> re-spelled again as "difficult", because we are entering a human phase
> where technology allow us to see, to learn, think and conclude better.


And you don't think we are going to discover MORE CONSTANTS???

                                GREY

P.S. I think all this discussion about time is based on the illusion that
time is some secondary dimension... My personal beleif is that time is the
first dimension, so everything is imbedded in it, no matter how much it
depends on "Spacial" characteristics to achieve anything.

I would much rather have a physicist define motion in terms that do not
have to include mass, but still require energy, than to define space
without time.