--- a/BCS_HST_2024-06-19/audio_2.txt	Sat Nov 02 15:49:47 2024 +0000
+++ b/BCS_HST_2024-06-19/audio_2.txt	Sat Nov 02 15:50:09 2024 +0000
@@ -1,202 +1,309 @@
-(Transcribed by TurboScribe.ai. Go Unlimited to remove this message.)
+BCS  (0:05 - 1:30)
 
-[Speaker 1] (0:05 - 1:30)
-If we talk about, not only about Sussman, but let's say, and what he meant by empirical or something, but just we talk about, well, the things we're talking about, the three parts, the base model, the Delta that turns it into a question answering machine, and the prompt engineering that turns a particular prompt into a particular prompt, basically, particular question into a particular prompt, say. And we talk for half an hour about that, and we end up using the word prompt for that which the third part of our tripartite distinction has turned a question into.
+If we talk about, not only about Sussman @?, but let's say, and what
+he meant by empirical or something, but just we talk about, well, the
+things we're talking about, the three parts, the base model, the Delta
+that turns it into a question answering machine, and the prompt
+engineering that turns a particular prompt into a particular prompt,
+basically, particular question into a particular prompt, say. And we
+talk for half an hour about that, and we end up using the word prompt
+for that which the third part of our tripartite distinction has turned
+a question into.
 
 That's right.
 
-[Speaker 2] (1:31 - 1:33)
+HST (1:31 - 1:33)
+
 Yeah. So far, so good.
 
-[Speaker 1] (1:35 - 2:35)
-What prompt means in our discourse at that moment is not something that necessarily could be propositionally expressed, even though I just used words to communicate it with you about it. But there's no reason to suspect the kinds of understanding that I can evoke with things like early Pereira or something should actually have, well, the form of articulation that we assume propositions have. So, I don't think, and, you know, take poetry as a kind of limit example.
+BCS (1:35 - 2:35)
 
-[Speaker 2] (2:36 - 2:36)
+What prompt means in our discourse at that moment is not something
+that necessarily could be propositionally expressed, even though I
+just used words to communicate it with you about it. But there's no
+reason to suspect the kinds of understanding that I can evoke with
+things like early Pereira or something should actually have, well, the
+form of articulation that we assume propositions have. So, I don't
+think, and, you know, take poetry as a kind of limit example.
+
+HST (2:36 - 2:36)
+
 Yeah.
 
-[Speaker 1] (2:36 - 3:10)
-I don't think there's any reason to suspect that the understanding process is ever, I mean, I think something needs to be said about articulation in the original sense of being hinged. But I guess poetry is unhinged.
+BCS (2:36 - 3:10)
 
-[Speaker 2] (3:13 - 5:36)
-Oh, absolutely. That's crucially important. That never occurred to me before.
+I don't think there's any reason to suspect that the understanding
+process is ever, I mean, I think something needs to be said about
+articulation in the original sense of being hinged. But I guess poetry
+is unhinged.
+
+HST (3:13 - 5:36)
 
-Maybe it did, because I feel like, boy, it just takes a minute. Sorry. No, no, it just takes me a minute to come up with a name when I need it.
-
-So, the former Archbishop of Canterbury, Raoul Williams, who was a prodigious intellect and whose Archbishopric founded, as so many of them have over the last 40 years over the marriage equality issue within the Anglican, the international Anglican community, um, wrote a book and gave a lecture, a series of lectures, a series of lectures, possibly even Gifford lectures, about the necessity of poetic discourse in the face of the divine, the infinite, whatever, you know, what he had spent his life promulgating. You know, it was, you could almost view it as an, and at the end of his, of his time in that role, a sort of apology pro vita sua in terms of the defense of, of the creed, which attempts to be wholly explicit about something, which he in the end feels it's impossible to be even, even usefully explicit, much less wholly explicit. And I feel guilty that I've never bought or tried to read the book, but I felt like I got most of what, the lectures were brilliant.
+So, the former Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, who was a
+prodigious intellect, ... wrote a book and gave a lecture, a series of
+lectures, a series of lectures, possibly even Gifford lectures, about
+the necessity of poetic discourse in the face of the divine, the
+infinite, whatever, what he had spent his life
+promulgating, you could almost view it, at
+the end of his time in that role, a sort of _apologia pro vita
+sua_.  [Regarding] the creed, which attempts to be
+wholly explicit about something, which he in the end feels it's
+impossible to be even usefully explicit, much less wholly
+explicit.
 
-And of course, you know, illustrated by lots of good, impenetrable, more or less penetrable poetry. Um, but that's something that it's, you never know where you're going to find somebody trying to share the same thought.
+And of course, you know, illustrated by lots of good, impenetrable,
+more or less penetrable poetry.  You never know where you're going to
+find somebody trying to share the same thought.
 
-[Speaker 1] (5:39 - 5:53)
-Well, I mean, this conversation we're having is a good example of what does poetry mean, right? We've already bent it like a, yeah, like a string on an electric guitar.
+BCS (5:39 - 5:53)
 
-[Speaker 2] (5:55 - 6:56)
-But that's what language is good for. I mean, again, this is, this is Robin Cooper's, you remember Robin, perhaps from the old days, his point that it's fundamental to the success of language, that what you understand by what I say is not what I meant by it. I'm exaggerating only slightly, right?
+Well, I mean, this conversation we're having is a good example of what
+does poetry mean, right? We've already bent it like a, yeah, like a
+string on an electric guitar.
+
+HST (5:55 - 6:56)
 
-He, somewhere, I don't know if he ever even wrote this. He used to give a critique of the so-called conduit metaphor, um, by saying, you know, it's, it's, that's, that's not just unhelpful. It's, it's incoherent.
+But that's what language is good for. This is
+Robin Cooper's
+point that it's fundamental to the success of language, that what you
+understand by what I say is not what I meant by it. I'm exaggerating
+only slightly, right?
 
-You can't take whatever my mental structures are and inject them into somebody else's brain by any means and get any useful results.
+He used to give a critique of the so-called conduit metaphor, saying
+that it's not just unhelpful, it's incoherent.
 
-[Speaker 1] (6:57 - 7:16)
-It's actually interesting because you could write a short story on, maybe science fiction, I don't know, um, on what would evolution have looked like if our spinal cords came to the surface.
+You can't take whatever my mental structures are and inject them into
+somebody else's brain by any means and get any useful results.
+
+BCS (6:57 - 7:16)
+
+It's actually interesting because you could write a short story on,
+maybe science fiction, I don't know, um, on what would evolution have
+looked like if our spinal cords came to the surface.
 
-[Speaker 2] (7:17 - 7:47)
-Right. Well, and I think that there are many people who think that, that once we, once we have a 38 pin socket at the base of our spinal cord, um, that turning a vat produced body into me is just a matter of cabling the one up into the other.
+HST (7:17 - 7:47)
 
-[Speaker 1] (7:47 - 7:49)
+Right. Well, and I think that there are many people who think that,
+that once we, once we have a 38 pin socket at the base of our spinal
+cord, um, that turning a vat produced body into me is just a matter of
+cabling the one up into the other.
+
+BCS (7:47 - 7:49)
+
 Right. With, with high bandwidth.
 
-[Speaker 2] (7:49 - 7:56)
-With high bandwidth and, and, and, uh, and, uh, whatever the neural equivalent, neural equivalent of our sync is.
+HST (7:49 - 7:56)
+
+With high bandwidth and whatever the neural equivalent, neural
+equivalent of rsync is.
+
+BCS (7:56 - 8:34)
 
-[Speaker 1] (7:56 - 8:34)
-Right. But it's interesting because one of the things that I think that deep learning folks have realized is that populating levels with arbitrary numbers of neurons or fake neurons or whatever, isn't always helpful. The reduction in, the reduction in number of neurons on a given level is often necessary in order to force the abstraction, basically.
+Right. But it's interesting because one of the things that I think
+that deep learning folks have realized is that populating levels with
+arbitrary numbers of neurons or fake neurons or whatever, isn't always
+helpful. The reduction in number of neurons on a given level is often
+necessary in order to force the abstraction, basically.
 
-[Speaker 2] (8:36 - 8:39)
-I don't think I'd heard that before. That's interesting.
+BCS (8:42 - 8:51)
 
-[Speaker 1] (8:42 - 8:51)
-I'm not sure I've heard it before, but that's certainly what I take. The fact that these things collapse, if they have too many neurons.
+I'm not sure I've heard it before, but that's certainly what I take: @?
+The fact that these things collapse, if they have too many
+neurons.
 
-[Speaker 2] (8:51 - 9:09)
-You can't just, you can't just throw more, you can always throw more data in, but you can't just throw more layers or, or nodes in the layers without, without some more architecture.
+HST (8:51 - 9:09)
+
+You can always throw more data in, but you can't just throw more
+layers or nodes in the layers without some more architecture.
 
-[Speaker 1] (9:10 - 9:16)
-That's right. Because it actually, it's not that it won't get any better. It'll actually get worse.
+BCS (9:10 - 9:16)
+
+That's right. Because it actually, it's not that it won't get any
+better. It'll actually get worse.
 
-[Speaker 2] (9:17 - 9:24)
-Yeah. Yeah. No, I guess I, well, because it will never, I think I would say, because it will never converge.
+HST (9:17 - 9:24)
 
-[Speaker 1] (9:25 - 9:27)
+I think I would say, because it will never converge.
+
+BCS (9:25 - 9:27)
+
 Never converge. That's what I meant to say. Yeah.
 
-[Speaker 2] (9:27 - 9:41)
-They're never settled. Yeah. Whatever.
+HST (9:27 - 9:41)
 
-Yeah. Because there's never, there's not, there's not enough, there's not enough pressure on the, on the, the channel. That's right.
+There's not enough pressure on the channel, 
+To make it effective in the coding required.
+
+BCS (9:41 - 9:42)
 
-To make it effective in coding required.
+Right.
+
+BCS (9:48 - 10:23)
 
-[Speaker 1] (9:41 - 9:42)
-Right. Right.
+So let's go back to the question is @? whether the metaphysical
+story, which might be actually just a more successful version of
+the anthropic principle. I don't know.
 
-[Speaker 2] (9:44 - 9:47)
-And so we'll just keep wandering around with stuff that is good enough.
+So anyway, I'm not going to use it [the anthropic principal] anymore.
+
+HST (10:24 - 10:33)
+
+I introduced it only because it's a shorthand for a line of thought.
+
+BCS (10:33 - 10:37)
 
-[Speaker 1] (9:48 - 10:23)
-So, okay. So let's go back to the question is whether the metaphysical story, which might be actually a, just a more successful version of the anthropic principle. I don't know.
+Yeah ... which has gone astray, I think.
+
+...
 
-I don't like what I've read under the... No, not under, well, I don't, yeah. So anyway, I'm not going to use it anymore.
+BCS (10:46 - 13:52)
 
-[Speaker 2] (10:24 - 10:33)
-No, I'm sorry. I, I introduced it only in, only because it's, again, see previous discussion, because it's a shorthand for a line of thought.
+The metaphysical question. I'm starting over. I have said that we are
+in, of, and about the world.
 
-[Speaker 1] (10:33 - 10:37)
-Yeah. No, it's, it is, which has gone astray, I think. But anyway.
+And the in and of are pretty serious facts. And it's funny writing
+about reflection, even though I'm not writing about reflection. But
+I'm kind of writing about, well, I'm writing about what I'm writing
+about the fundamental notion of computing as revealed by looking at
+reflection.
 
-[Speaker 2] (10:43 - 10:46)
-But you were going to say that. Yeah.
-
-[Speaker 1] (10:46 - 13:52)
-The metaphysical question. Well, you know, I, I have said, sorry, I'm starting over. I have said that we are in, of, and about the world.
-
-And the in and of are pretty serious facts. And it's funny writing about reflection, even though I'm not writing about reflection. But I'm kind of writing about, well, I'm writing about what I'm writing about the fundamental notion of computing as revealed by looking at reflection.
+And the reason reflection is such a salutary example is that, you
+know, I take computation to be a dialectic of meaning and mechanism (to
+refer to the other book that I want to write). It both represents and
+does. And, but crucially, it represents and does. @delete one?@
 
-And the reason reflection is such a salutary example is that, you know, I take computation to be a dialectic of meaning and mechanism to refer to the other book that I want to write. It both represents and does. And, but crucially, it represents and does.
-
-And it needs to represent its representation, it needs to represent its doing, and it needs to be able to do what it represents itself as doing and whatever. I mean, it's, it exemplifies, and it's both part of its properties, it exemplifies the properties that can represent, which is, forces a certain kind of discipline on it. And that fact about reflection reflection is, is related to, I mean, I feel now as if I'm instantiating this idea that the layers need fewer neurons, because I'm losing neurons at a rate that's forcing everything into being the same thing.
+And it needs to represent its representation, it needs to represent
+its doing, and it needs to be able to do what it represents itself as
+doing and whatever. It exemplifies, and it's both part
+of its properties, it exemplifies the properties that can represent,
+which forces a certain kind of discipline on it. And that fact
+about reflection reflection @? is, is related to [pause?@] I mean, I feel now as
+if I'm instantiating this idea that the layers need fewer neurons,
+because I'm losing neurons at a rate that's forcing everything into
+being the same thing.
 
-But that fact about us being here and representing being here, and what the constraints on that are, is a pretty serious fact about how we think, I think. And I think the ontological facts that the use of differential equations in physics represents, which are never given a name, but that's what I think they, the Dyson sort of is, is just one of the things that is pushed on us. That's a funny use of the word push, but it's one of the things we're, we're not normatively accountable to, we just are bluntly accountable to.
+But that fact about us being here and representing being here, and
+what the constraints on that are, is a pretty serious fact about how
+we think, I think. And I think the ontological facts that the use of
+differential equations in physics represents, which are never given a
+name, but that's what I think they, the deixis sort of is, is just one
+of the things that is pushed on us. That's a funny use of the word
+push, but it's one of the things we're, we're not normatively
+accountable to, we just are bluntly accountable to.
 
-[Speaker 2] (13:52 - 13:55)
-Yeah, we're obliged by, we're obliged, much better circumstance.
+HST (13:52 - 13:55)
 
-[Speaker 1] (13:56 - 13:57)
+Yeah, we're obliged by, we're obliged @?, much better circumstance.
+
+BCS (13:56 - 13:57)
+
 Thank you, yeah, we're obliged.
 
-[Speaker 2] (14:01 - 15:32)
-So that, I think that, that claim that you just uttered, I don't understand. And I think elucidating it, and maybe the elucidation is in the objects book if I went back and found it, but it's not, but, but I think it's necessary if you want to, I mean, the problem is at the, at the purely sort of tactical level, whether the, whether it's necessary to take 10 or 15 pages to reformulate each of the two stories in order to demonstrate that they converge. Right.
+HST (14:01 - 15:32)
+
+[edit this heavily @?]
 
-Or, you know, it's, I haven't, it feels to me like that's not perhaps what you would like to do, but it's the only structure that I've been able to think of given what we've been saying so far. But, but maybe there's another I mean, yeah. Because there, the problem is that there are critical steps in each of those, which, which you understand, and which you may or may not have articulated in one place or another, is, you know, right.
+So that, I think that, that claim that you just uttered, I don't
+understand. And I think elucidating it, and maybe the elucidation is
+in the objects book if I went back and found it, but it's not, but,
+but I think it's necessary if you want to, I mean, the problem is at
+the, at the purely sort of tactical level, whether the, whether it's
+necessary to take 10 or 15 pages to reformulate each of the two
+stories in order to demonstrate that they converge. Right.
+
+Or, you know, it's, I haven't, it feels to me like that's not perhaps
+what you would like to do, but it's the only structure that I've been
+able to think of given what we've been saying so far. But, but maybe
+there's another I mean, yeah. Because there, the problem is that there
+are critical steps in each of those, which, which you understand, and
+which you may or may not have articulated in one place or another, is,
+you know, right.
 
 Well, already, but they haven't been pulled together in a way.
 
-[Speaker 1] (15:32 - 15:41)
-No, I think that's absolutely right. And I think my tendency would be to recapitulate both of them in one to 2000 pages.
+BCS (15:32 - 15:41)
 
-[Speaker 2] (15:42 - 15:47)
+No, I think that's absolutely right. And I think my tendency would be
+to recapitulate both of them in one to 2000 pages.
+
+HST (15:42 - 15:47)
+
 Yes, well, that would serve nobody's interest.
 
-[Speaker 1] (15:48 - 17:54)
-And one thing also that's interesting about the Dykes' story is it, it is obvious to a very small number of people, all of whom I believe are computer scientists. And that's, I mean, it's just an interesting intellectual history sort of fact. And very smart people, like my friend whose name escapes me right now, young Rosa Tao, father's a philosopher of science.
+BCS (15:48 - 17:54)
+
+And one thing also that's interesting about the deixis story is that
+it is obvious to a very small number of people, all of whom I believe
+are computer scientists. And that's just an interesting
+intellectual history sort of fact. And very smart people, like my
+friend [whose name escapes me right now, young Rosa Tao ?@], father's a
+philosopher of science.
 
-She's got two PhDs, one in philosophy, one in neuroscience now. And she's on the faculty at Stanford. And, and I like her too much.
+She's got two PhDs, one in philosophy, one in neuroscience now. And
+she's on the faculty at Stanford. And, and I like her too much.
 
-But anyway, I'm not in touch with her. She, I mean, she and I have had this explicit conversation about why it's obvious that the structure of indexicals in language, and the structure of magnetism, and the way physics is expressed in terms of properties, not objects, and that the regularities are differential, which is why the differential equations are used, are the same fact. And it just strikes her as inane and absolutely not.
+She and I have had this explicit conversation about why it's obvious
+that the structure of indexicals in language, and the structure of
+magnetism, and the way physics is expressed in terms of properties,
+not objects, and that the regularities are differential, which is why
+the differential equations are used, are the same fact. And it just
+strikes her as inane and absolutely not.
 
 They have nothing to do with each other.
 
-[Speaker 2] (17:56 - 17:59)
-It's certainly not inane, but it's not immediately F-able either.
+HST (17:56 - 17:59)
 
-[Speaker 1] (18:00 - 18:20)
-Well, not only is it not immediately F-able, but I feel as if I tried to express it in the objects book, I've tried to express it in numerous places since, and none of my expressions of it have actually made any headway with the people to whom it's not obvious, which is interesting.
+It's certainly not inane, but it's not immediately effable @sp? to me either.
+
+BCS (18:00 - 18:20)
 
-[Speaker 2] (18:20 - 18:34)
-I mean, so can you, can you name anybody to who, who, who you have, who has successfully, in fact, maybe already before you even mentioned it, grasped this, that I might know?
+Well, not only is it not immediately effable, but I feel as if I tried
+to express it in the objects book, I've tried to express it in
+numerous places since, and none of my expressions of it have actually
+made any headway with the people to whom it's not obvious, which is
+interesting.
 
-[Speaker 1] (18:35 - 18:47)
-Well, Jun is one, but as I said to Jill, Jun probably understands my work as it were better than anybody, but nobody can understand him.
-
-[Speaker 2] (18:50 - 18:55)
-Yeah, that's, I mean, it is, it is, there is this lack of transitivity in things like that.
+HST (18:20 - 18:34)
 
-[Speaker 1] (18:58 - 19:09)
-So it's a puzzle to me, to what extent he should be named as, you know.
+Can you name anybody who has successfully, maybe already before you
+even mentioned it, grasped this?
 
-[Speaker 2] (19:09 - 19:14)
-Whether he'll, he'll, he'll, he'll appear for the defense in court.
-
-[Speaker 1] (19:15 - 19:21)
-Right. He failed his PhD oral at Duke in philosophy.
+BCS (18:35 - 18:47)
 
-[Speaker 2] (19:22 - 19:25)
-Yeah, I'm sure that could be said of many good people.
+Well, Jun is one, but as I said to Jill, Jun probably understands my
+work as it were better than anybody, but nobody can understand him.
 
-[Speaker 1] (19:28 - 19:34)
-Anyway, yeah, whether he should be custodian of the oeuvre, at any rate.
+[cut all this@?]
+  BCS (18:58 - 19:09)
 
-[Speaker 2] (19:36 - 19:51)
-Well, I mean, that's, that's gotta be a goal. That has got to be a goal, it seems to me, to try to, to break through that logjam, but maybe, maybe too hard for this life. You were just going to revert to Fernando.
+  So it's a puzzle to me, to what extent he should be named as, you
+  know...
 
-[Speaker 1] (19:52 - 20:16)
-Yes, I think he, I don't know if I just made this up, but I think he's somebody who thought, oh yeah, of course, that's obvious. And actually, someone who definitely thinks it's obvious is, I guess he's still with us in some sense. I had a psychotic break.
+  HST (19:09 - 19:14)
 
-Out at UCLA for a year.
+  Whether he'll appear for the defense in court.
 
-[Speaker 2] (20:20 - 20:34)
-Oh yeah, yeah. Him. Him, yes.
+  BCS (19:15 - 19:21)
 
-I'll fill in reference. I can do that. Oh dear, give me 90 seconds and I'll have the name, I think, usually.
+  Right. He failed his PhD oral at Duke in philosophy.
+
+  HST (19:22 - 19:25)
 
-[Speaker 1] (20:35 - 20:38)
-Because that's how long it takes to look something up.
+  Yeah, I'm sure that could be said of many good people.
 
-[Speaker 2] (20:39 - 20:47)
-Well, it's how, I mean, no, I can't, I can't actually make it happen. It's not a process. It's not a consciously accessible process.
+  BCS (19:28 - 19:34)
 
-[Speaker 1] (20:48 - 20:50)
-But it's 90 seconds of your brain, not 90 seconds.
+  Anyway, yeah, whether he should be custodian of the oeuvre, at any
+  rate.
 
-[Speaker 2] (20:50 - 21:02)
-Yeah, I mean, I often find that the name I'm looking for comes along after the conversation has moved on by about a minute, subjectively.
+HST (19:36 - 19:51)
 
-[Speaker 1] (21:03 - 21:24)
-I have a problem in my eye that I have very bad, what are they called? Anyway, foggy bits of my eye, which mean that whatever I focus on goes blurry.
+That has got to be a goal, it seems to me, to try to break through
+that logjam, but maybe, maybe too hard for this life. You were just
+going to revert to Fernando.
 
-[Speaker 2] (21:27 - 21:32)
-And my mobile phone camera has that problem.
+BCS (19:52 - 20:16)
 
-[Speaker 1] (21:34 - 21:38)
-So that might be true of attention too. Yeah.
-
-(Transcribed by TurboScribe.ai. Go Unlimited to remove this message.)
\ No newline at end of file
+Yes, I think he, I don't know if I just made this up, but I think he's
+somebody who thought, oh yeah, of course, that's obvious. And
+actually, someone who definitely thinks it's obvious [is Pengy guy]

--- /dev/null	Thu Jan 01 00:00:00 1970 +0000
+++ b/CR_preface.txt	Sat Nov 02 15:50:09 2024 +0000
@@ -0,0 +1,167 @@
+Born December 1949.
+
+After starting a degree at Oberlin in 1967, dropped out without
+completing 3rd year.
+
+Out to BC with Katy in the fall of 1969, back to Cambridge and
+Philadelphia to see respective families.
+
+Had to get out of the US (draft), so that winter took over the old job
+of his brother Arnold in an NRC high-energy Physics lab, living with
+Katy and Arnold in an old farmhouse in a posh neighbourhood in Ottawa.
+Very snowy winter, record-breaking, 18 feet?, long driveway and a lot
+of shovelling, piled up to the 2nd floor.  Involve with Ottawa QUaker
+Meeting, a youth group, and a Mennonite youth group.  Stayed through
+the several years.  March 1971, employer partnering with the Univ. of
+Chicago Physics dept and LRL in Berkeley, went there, installed a
+PDP-9 / 15, in a 40-ft Fruehof trailer, moved from Ottawa to Fermi
+Lab, where Brian's office was.  Programmed in machine language (see
+below).  He could 'program like crazy' in the air-conditioned trailer,
+high-volume music in head-phones, but couldn't write English.  Lived
+in a hotel in Hyde ? park.  They owned an Austin Mini bought for $100
+in summer of 1970, working at a Quaker peace conference on Rhinestone
+island in lake near Ottawa.
+
+Katy went out to Berkeley that spring, where the experiment was to
+take place.  Married in June of 1971 at Pendle Hill / Swarthmore, then
+back to Berkeley.  Lived in a back yard house at Telegraph and Shannon
+(?).  Legally a Canadian resident notionally in US on a business trip.
+Experiment ran, wrapped and went back to Ottawa.  He wanted to stay in
+US, they ended up (autumn 1971?  1972?) living with his parents in
+Cambridge, where WCS was by then head of the new Center for the Study
+of World Religions at Harvard.
+
+[Applied to Graduate School at MIT in EECS, started taking some
+courses, but eventually MIT admin said be couldn't be admitted w/o a
+UG degree.]
+
+Interested in being a social inquiry major, in order to study the
+politics of high technology, how we get to transferring to EECS from
+that goal is not clear.
+
+It was very quickly clear that the understanding of computing that the
+social scientists were critiquing was not [Programming in machine
+language] the computing that I know.  So I need to get clear on what
+computing really is, so that I can legitimately critique it.  So I
+thought I had to go into the heart of the beast, as it were.
+
+Terry Winograd provided the friendship and both social and 'official'
+support-structure to allow Brian to start to express himself out loud,
+as it were.  
+
+Saying to Fodor, ref. Tom Swift and his procedural grandmother, that
+"this is not how compilation worked", Fodor was blustery but
+open-minded enough to say "this is your subject area, I'm sure you're
+rightl tell me how it does work".  He and Fodor were friends, but
+later Fodor "curdled".
+
+Dog hanging on to a scented cloth -- sitting at the console of a 360
+and keying in instructinos and debugging by staring at the pattern of
+lights that the console frooze in.
+
+Articulating an understanding of computing that would do justice to his
+intuitive understanding of computing as he had experienced it is the
+theme of all his intellectual work.
+
+"Course on compilers, I had written a compiler, I'd written a tiny OS
+for a PDP-9 running a physics experiment".  Pat Winston sat me down
+and took me through the requirements for a CSEE degree, and decided
+he'd satisfied them all.  But he needed a Batchelor's thesis, so they
+took a paper from a course he'd taken in the autumn, called "Comments
+on Comments", and added some stuff, it got marked and accepted as his
+thesis, so awarded the degree and could actually be enrolled as a
+student under the supervision of Peter Szolovits.
+
+[CSLI not particularly relevant]
+
+[CPSR?]
+
+----------
+Torn between religion and physics as an undergraduate.
+
+MIT, 1974++ MSc thesis _Levels, Layers and Planes_, about
+architectural properties of computer science
+There are no particulars in physics [ref. deiexis discussion, where is
+it]
+WHat drove me out of social inquiry and back to department 6 was
+needing to be back in the practice.  That skill was not somthing that
+people on the outside understood.
+
+Lens on a conical base, watchmakers, with oil and iron filings, that
+allowed you to manifest the data on digital mag tape.  No disks on the
+PDP-9.  That concrete engagement with the computer affected my sense
+of digitality.
+
+I wanted there to be types, not tokens.  Set theory has no constants
+(e.g. pi, e, i), functions, derivatives, intergrals are types in a
+way.  Wanted a KR that didn't depend on token identity (no eq tests in
+the interpreter).
+
+LLP was an attempt to get the things, "kernel facts", of a KRL to be
+types, not tokens (cf *car* and *cdr* vs. differentiation and
+integration), the ontology of the computational.
+
+[HST mentions intergral signs and script deltas] Brian says
+"syncategoramaticity
+
+Promote the eq tests into type tests (in the interpreter).
+
+"You want to arrange the metaphysics so that _everything_ falls out"
+G. Nunberg of BCS
+
+My imagination was arrested by essentially foundational questions
+about ... this stuff.  Not interested in applications, AI as such,
+etc.
+
+Still wanted to know what computing was., remains true up to what's in
+this book, CR.
+
+Something else that makes me feel uncomfortable about CS from the
+outset: Conversation with MM: for you MM science is a form of worship,
+whereas science is a form of theology for me (BCS), so I look to CS
+not just to manifest the glory of God, but also to explain it.
+
+Science should do justice to that.
+
+Being shy around Peter and Butler, something else made me skittish,
+something I needed in order to be at peace: a warmth / humility.  Why
+I was at peace with [John] Haugeland.  [HST: JH wasn't a
+programmer. BCS: Yes, but he programmed [in] Postscript.  BCS: We
+disagreed about typography].
+
+Had a sense with JH that even though he knew a lot more philosophy
+than I did, that we were looking together at relative
+clauses/propositional claims, not that he was scrutinising
+me. [ref. Andee Rubin]
+
+In the book I claim that deferential semantics is the heart of
+intentionality.  "There is more in heaven and on earth than is drempt
+of in your philosophy".  CS is fundamentally an intentional subject
+matter, and that its intentional character has been hidden, and that
+its use of semantics has usurped it for mechanistic purposes.
+
+All semantical vocabulary has been redefined in mechanistic terms:
+"the semantics of X" == "what will happen if X is processed"
+
+Thereby all humility and deference is lost.
+
+[What about Phi vs. Psi, 'full [?] procedural consequence']
+
+If you are interested in _real_ semantics, ... what's a poor boy to
+do?
+
+ 
+
+------------
+Foundations of/Philosophy of Computation
+
+Lisp was 'broken', 2-Lisp was a flawed attempt to fix it, 3-Lisp takes
+us in to new territory.
+
+Don't think you have to be a specialist to read this book.
+
+Effective vs non-Effective is actually new: at the book boundaries,
+project onto the effective [?]
+
+
+

Binary file Reflections · 01 — Overview · Text (V0.91).pdf has changed