Philosophy Dictionary of ArgumentsHome
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| Parts, philosophy: in contrast to elements of a set, parts of a whole can stand in hierarchical relations. There may be dependencies, in particular ontological dependencies between parts and whole, as well as between parts of a whole, because parts may not exist if a questionable part does not exist. See also extrinsic, transitivity, reflexivity, symmetry, mereology, set theory, elements, order, overlap, dependency, ontological dependence._____________Annotation: The above characterizations of concepts are neither definitions nor exhausting presentations of problems related to them. Instead, they are intended to give a short introduction to the contributions below. – Lexicon of Arguments. | |||
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Marvin Minsky on Parts - Dictionary of Arguments
Minsky I 50 Parts/explanation/Minsky: The idea of a single, central Self doesn't explain anything. This is because a thing with no parts provides nothing that we can use as pieces of explanation! Then why do we so often embrace the strange idea that what we do is done by Someone Else — that is, our Self? Because so much of what our minds do is hidden from the [other] parts of us that are involved with consciousness. >Explanation, >Self/Minsky, >Self, >Consciousness, >Complexity, >Simplicity. I 146 Parts/wholes/Minsky: E.g. An obstacle is an object that interferes with the goal of moving in a certain direction. To be trapped is to be unable to move in any acceptable direction. Therefore we're trapped, since there are only four acceptable directions - up, down, left, or right - and each of them is separately blocked. Psychologically, however, there's something missing in that explanation: it doesn't quite describe our sense of being trapped. When you're caught inside a box, you feel as though something is trying to keep you there. The box seems more than just its separate sides; you don't feel trapped by any particular side. Artificial intelligence/Minsky: In order to represent this concept of trap or enclosure, we'll first need a way to represent the idea of a container. But the same idea is also important not only physically, but psychologically, as a mental implement for envisioning and understanding other, more complicated structures. This is because the idea of a set of all possible directions is one of the great, coherent, cross-realm correspondences that can be used in many different realms of thought. >Descriptions/Minsky._____________Explanation of symbols: Roman numerals indicate the source, arabic numerals indicate the page number. The corresponding books are indicated on the right hand side. ((s)…): Comment by the sender of the contribution. Translations: Dictionary of Arguments The note [Concept/Author], [Author1]Vs[Author2] or [Author]Vs[term] resp. "problem:"/"solution:", "old:"/"new:" and "thesis:" is an addition from the Dictionary of Arguments. If a German edition is specified, the page numbers refer to this edition. |
Minsky I Marvin Minsky The Society of Mind New York 1985 Minsky II Marvin Minsky Semantic Information Processing Cambridge, MA 2003 |
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Ed. Martin Schulz, access date 2024-04-17