🚀 go-pugleaf

Well, it seems as if we've gotten to the point where we agree that
something other than just the physical entity (entities) in the
Chinese room are doing the understanding.  The consensus seems to be
that some ``pattern'' is doing the understanding.  The question comes
down to what a pattern is.

To me the problem seems to be that a pattern doesn't exist without
some mind to perceive it.  This is what I think Ronald Bodkin is
saying in this quotation:

``I would say that pattern has an epistemological status, in that it
is perceived by minds, and if there is a potential for any mind or
anything which can "think" to discover it, it exists, but that pattern
is not ontological (i.e. essentially part of the nature of being) --
so that in the universe after energy death there is no pattern.''

He then goes on to say:

``So this is why one can speak of pattern and yet not be speaking of a
mind-stuff, since that DOES postulate a somewhat more "concrete"
reality for that stuff.''

The alternatives seem to be that either a pattern has some independent
existence of its own (concrete reality) or a mind is necessary to
perceive it.  On the one hand, I say we have dualism; on the other
hand, I say we have the ``hermeneutical hall of mirrors'', where we
project our own thought processes onto something in the outside world.

-Fred Gilham   gilham@csl.sri.com