The discovery of the artificial
Subtitle: behavior, mind, and machines before and beyond cybernetics
By: by Roberto Cordeschi.
Series: Studies in cognitive systems -- v. 28
Publisher: Kluwer Academic Publishers
Published: 2002
Place of publication: Dordrecht; Boston
Language: eng
Number of pages: 312
Subjects: Cybernetics.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. 281-295) and indexes.
Table of contents: title: Machine generated contents note: Chapter 1 Chemical machines and action systems 1. Introduction. Living organisms and machines 1 2. Loeb and the orientation mechanisms of Hammond: "natural" and "artificial" machines 3 3. The dispute over automata after Huxley. "Automatic" and "plastic" regulation of behavior 11 4. Jennings and the action system 17 5. Machines and functional organization 23 6. Men, animals and machines. Reductionism and mentalistic language 27 Chapter 2 Nervous conduction: early connectionism, physical analogies and machines 1. Introduction. Neurological hypotheses and machines 31 2. Nervous conduction as drainage: Spencer, James and McDougall 33 3. Meyer's drainage theory and the limits of mechanical analogy 44 4. Thordike and the origins of connectionism 52 5. Inorganic nervous systems: Bent Russell's machine 56 6. Other ideas about nervous conduction 63 7. Engineers' machines and biologists' machines 67 8. Stephens' connectionist machine 75 Chapter 3 The Robot Approach 1. Introduction. Forms of learning 82 2. Simulating learning processes 85 3. Rashevsky's physics of mind 94 4. Automatism and rudimentary forms of thought 98 5. "Ultra-automatism." Hull's "psychic" machine 101 6. The advent of robotics and developments of Hull's simulation method 106 7. What happened to the robot approach? 111 Chapter 4 Behavior, purpose and teleology 1. Introduction. Teleological explanations 116 2. Adaptation as equilibration. Lillie and the "reconciliation" of teleology with science 119 3. Warren and teleology as a scientific problem 123 4. Purpose in the natural world and in artefacts 125 5. True and derivative teleology 128 6. Learning and teleology: Perry, McDougall and Tolman 132 7. Craik's symbolic theory of thought and synthetic method 137 8. Learning and feedback 148 Chapter 5 Cybernetics and the origins of Artificial Intelligence 1. Introduction. The turning point 153 2. Cybernetic robotics 155 3. Mechanical models and theories of behavior 163 4. The intelligent computer 170 5. The origins of Artificial Intelligence 176 Chapter 6 New steps towards the artificial 1. Introduction: symbols or neurons? 187 2. Meaning and knowledge: some difficulties for AI 190 3. Common-sense problems for computers 198 4. The origins of cognitive science. Old and new connectionism 211 5. Artificial Life and the development of robotics 226 Chapter 7 The many forms of the artificial 1. Five theses on the artificial 241 2. Some initial distinctions 242 3. The modeling method and functionalism 246 4. Representations and mentalistic language 257 5. The discovery of the artificial: hopes, defeats and successes 273.