Newsgroups: bit.listserv.csg-l
Date:         Wed, 18 Nov 1992 13:31:21 EST
From:         mmt@BEN.DCIEM.DND.CA
Subject: Re: Complexes of perceptions

[Martin Taylor 921118 11:30]
(Bill Powers 921117.2000)

>>Martin, you say you would like to use "belief" to mean a structured
>perception. I think we agree that what you mean by a structured
>perception is a collection of scalar perceptual signals. But a
>collection of signals, just by coexisting, does not create any special
>kind of perception.
>...
>What creates something structured out of a collection of scalar
>perceptual signals is a _higher level perceptual function_.
>...
> The effect of this higher
>level perceptual function is to represent the presence of a particular
>kind of structuring AS A SIGNAL, in this case a signal standing for the
>presence of a relationship called simultaneity. But the presence of
>simultaneity means nothing unless it is perceived and explicitly
>represented.
>...
>The basic tenet of HPCT is that nothing is perceived unless it is
>represented as a perceptual signal. This includes what you call
>"structuring" of a set of signals.
>...
>This is a very difficult point to communicate. I hope it's getting
>across, at least a little. A "complex of perceptions" appears as
>something unitary only to a perceptual function capable of perceiving
>that kind of thing and signalling that it is present.

Well, I don't think it is a difficult point to get across, at all.  It is
the same point that AI researchers use in defining symbols to "mean" somthing,
and the point against which connectionists rail when they argue for
distributed representations.  In my discussion about structured percepts
and structured control systems, I am taking an agnostic point of view on
the matter.  There is absolutely nothing about a structured percept that
prevents that structure from being the result of a perceptual input function
in a higher ECS, but neither is there any reason why such a higher ECS must
exist.

HPCT does not have as a basic principle that the *conscious* perception of
something depends on the existence of a scalar perceptual signal representing
the CEV that the "something" corresponds to.  HPCT says nothing explicitly
about *conscious* perception (i.e. the everyday sense of the term "perception").
HPCT deals with the control of scalar perceptual signals, which in some as
yet mysterious way presumably relate to conscious perception.  Structured
percepts are indeed in the mind of the analyst, but they are also composed
of elements that are controlled perceptual signals, and the analyst sees that
they tend to be controlled as a bunch--a complex.  Quite conceivably, they
are consciously perceived as a unitary multidimensional complex by the mind
in which they reside, but that's not part of the deal.

No, your point isn't difficult.  It is, I think, unnecessary.  It raises
the same flags as the "grandmother cell" does, and thereby warns people
off directions of enquiry that might be profitable.

> Two different
>perceptual functions receiving the same set of lower-order perceptions
>can easily perceive different "complexes" in it. The complex is in the
>perceptual function of the beholder.

This is quite right, and there is no reason why a complex should not serve
as input to any number of perceptual functions, while still acting as a
complex.  If you can imagine it, think of performing a golf swing (or a tennis
racket).  You can *consciously* perceive the swing, or the complex of
muscle tensions, or both.  This example doesn't exactly catch what I am
talking about, because it refers to conscious perception, but it provides
an analogy that might be useful.

Please note that I am remaining agnostic as to whether complexes as such have
reality outside the mind of the analyst, or whether the higher ECSs that
convert them to scalar perceptual signals are actually necessary.

Martin