Ch. 5: Neural Networks

Chris OConnor · Posted: Wed Aug 13, 2008 6:39 pm Post subject: Ch. 5: Neural Networks

Ch. 5: Neural Networks

Please use this thread for discussing Ch. 5: Neural Networks. Icecream

Grim · Posted: Fri Aug 29, 2008 9:46 pm Post subject:

Hmm, he is really working up to something big I can tell.

I wonder how he can classify knowledge as a mental state similar to fear or happiness, it seem to me to be somewhat different. I feel that there is something missing in his connection of emotions to a feeling of knowing.

Emotions and feeling of knowing can both be triggered by external stimulation he argues and so the evidence is presents but I feel that something is not just right about putting the two neural function so close together.

I think that an emotion can overwhelm you but I have never become overwhelmed with a feeling of knowing. I have been excited in my understanding of something, perhaps that is the emotion of it.

I have become lost in the definition of expressing feeling.

Knowledge is a summation of experiences as are your emotions.

I struggle with an imperfect understanding of the topic, and stagger and the broadness of emotions definition.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emotion

JulianTheApostate · Posted: Mon Sep 15, 2008 12:58 am Post subject:

Since I already knew a lot about neural networks, most of my comments are nits.

There are many machine-learning techniques besides neural networks. When Burton claims that Amazon book recommendations use neural networks, I wonder whether his certainty is justified. Unfortunately, he doesn't include any references, and a quick Google search didn't provide any insight.

Also, when Burton uses the phrase relational database on page 47, he's not using the standard computer science definition of the term.

DWill · Posted: Sat Sep 20, 2008 6:27 pm Post subject:

I'm scratching my head a bit over the connection between neural networks and the feeling of knowing as a primary emotion (or sensation?)He tells us that it is "the interaction of conscious thought and the involuntary feeling of knowing" that "determines how we feel we know what we know." But I thought that the feeling of knowing was the feeling that we know what we know--by his definition. Now he explains how this conscious feeling of knowing needs to arise from some processing in the "hidden layer.

He seems to be getting at how consciousness occurs within this hidden layer. Again, lose the link with the specific feeling of knowing.

The neural networks also explain how our habits, beliefs, and judgments are formed and why they are so difficult to change; they're established pathways. An important point about neural networks is that they aren't localized in the brain; they draw on input from many separate areas of the brain. Burton says that, in effect, the networks [/i]are[i] the brain.
DWill


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