Week 2

Question 1

Skinner’s Verbal Behavior book argument

Answer 1

He argued that children learn language through reinforced learning (operant conditioning)
- children imitate what they hear.
- correct speech is rewarded.
- children then generalize to new situations and new reinforcement begins once again.

Question 2

Noam Chomsky

Answer 2

Points out flaws in Skinner’s work
1. How do we talk about past experiences? What present stimulus triggers that response
2. How do children learn sentences that aren’t;t reinforced (ex: i hate you)
3. How do children talk about imaginary things if there isn’t a stimulus there to trigger it ad they haven’t heard it before?

Question 3

Noam Chimsky’s main argument

Answer 3

There must be some innate biological factors that determine how language is learned, not merely external reinforcement.

Question 4

Alan Turing

Answer 4

Turing machine could theoretically carry out any mathematical computation. (Thought exp not actual machine)

• knowledge ‘beliefs’ could be conceptualized as symbolic information ad processed in very simple, discrete steps.
• suggests intelligent capabilities (logic, memory, learning) are not inherently biological. They can be implemented in a machine.

Question 5

Claude Shannon

Answer 5

• 1983: first to describe how Boolean algebra could be implemented using electronic circuits.
• 1948: He invented information theory as a mathematical theory of communication that measured how much information is contained in a message, given the user’s knowledge. Was the basis for digital communication, storage, and computing.
• 1950: Built ‘Theseus’ robotic mouse that used telephone relays to represent a maze ad Lear how to find a target thru trial and error.
• 1943 met with Alan Turing at bell las and discussed applications of the Turing machine.

Question 6

Turing Test

Answer 6

If a computer can produce communication (behavior) that is indistinguishable from a human operator, then the computer can be said to be intelligent.

maybe human mind can be represented as a computer -> Machine would posses attention, learning, and memory.
(Essential formulation of AI)

Question 7

Artificial Intelligence

Answer 7

“Making a machine behave in ways that would be called intelligent if a human were so behaving”

“Logic Theorist” was presented as the first example of a “thinking machine”

Question 8

Logic Theorist

Answer 8

Herb Simon and Alan Newell created a program that used basic human-like reasoning processes (logic) to create proofs of mathematical theorems.
Considered the first AI program.

Question 9

George Miller

Answer 9

He wanted to apply information theory to human communication and reasoning after Shannon’s paper.

• Found that when judging the magnitude of something across a scale, people were limited to about 7 alternative values. (This is why many rating scales rank things from 1 – 7.)
• Average number of digits someone could hold in memory was about 7, plus or minus 2.
• Following an information processing theory approach, he would help lead Cognitive Psychology in the study of capacity limitations of the mind.