Abstract
There is a problem associated with contemporary studies of philosophy of mind, which focuses on the identification and convergence of human and machine intelligence. This is the problem of machine emulation of sense. In the present study, analysis of this problem is carried out based on concepts from structural and post-structural approaches that have been almost entirely overlooked by contemporary philosophy of mind. If we refer to the basic definitions of “sign” and “meaning” found in structuralism and post-structuralism, we see a fundamental difference between the capabilities of a machine and the human brain engaged in the processing of a sign. This research will exemplify and provide additional evidence to support distinctions between syntactic and semantic aspects of intelligence, an issue widely discussed by adepts of contemporary philosophy of mind. The research will demonstrate that some aspect of a number of ideas proposed in relation to semantics and semiosis in structuralism and post-structuralism are similar to those we find in contemporary analytical studies related to the theory and philosophy of artificial intelligence. The concluding part of the paper offers an interpretation of the problem of formalization of sense, connected to its metaphysical (transcendental) properties.
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Notes
For example, one of the French structuralists, E. Souriau, having analyzed the entire body of European dramaturgy, reduced them to just six possible functions and to five combinations, the total number of possible combinations being 210,141 (François 1991). In turn, Propp, a Russian folklorist and philologist, who greatly influenced European structuralism, operated a significantly smaller number of potentially possible plots of fairy tales, around 2,500 stories, in accordance with the famous index of stories by Aarne-Thompson (Propp 1968, Aarne 1955–1958; 1961; Thompson 1977). Propp discovered that the components of motifs of fairy tales are not combined randomly, but are represented by a finite number of acts-functions performed by a finite number of characters and are arranged in a certain order. A total of 32 functions were identified (for example, a loss, a wedding, a presentation of an award or a restriction) and 7 characters (the Villain, the Dispatcher, the (Magical) Helper, the Princess, the Donor, the Hero, the False hero), which, combined, form the structure of the story line of a fairy tale (Propp 1968). This structure can be presented in a simplified way: the violation of a prohibition and the actions of the Villain lead to a loss, which is then restored due to the actions of the Hero in cooperation with the Donor and the Helper. The Hero then celebrates a victory over the Villain, the False Hero is exposed, and the true Hero is then rewarded with the participation of the Princess.
It is noteworthy that there is a trend in the modern literature on artificial intelligence to perceive some structuralists (G. Deleuze and F. Guattari) as philosophers, whose works offer an optimistic outlook on AI (De Landa 2011; Schomaker et al. 2013). Such a perception of their works is based on their reasoning concerning automatization of the modern world and humankind (Deleuze and Guattari 1972). Meanwhile, such optimism will hardly appear grounded if we consider the results of their analysis of sense and the nature of signs.
A. Greimas’ model is used in the following example, which shows that any work can be formalized through the use of 6 “actants” (Subject – Object, Addressee – Addresser, Helper – Opponent), which are related to each other through the relations of modality (“wish,” “know,” “be able to”), and which perform 20 possible functions (Greimas 1964).
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The article was prepared within the framework of the Academic Fund Program at the National Research University Higher School of Economics (HSE) in 2016–2017 (grant № 16-01-0032) and supported within the framework of a subsidy granted to the HSE by the Government of the Russian Federation for the implementation of the Global Competitiveness Program.
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Gasparyan, D. Artificial Intelligence and Semantics through the Prism of Structural, Post-Structural and Transcendental Approaches. Integr. psych. behav. 50, 704–743 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12124-016-9344-8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12124-016-9344-8