Goodbye, Descartes: The End of Logic and the Search for a New Cosmology of the Mind - Hardcover

Devlin, Keith

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0471142166 ISBN 13: 9780471142164

Publisher: Wiley, 1997

Synopsis

"[Goodbye, Descartes] is certain to attract attention and controversy..a fascinating journey to the edges of logical thinking and beyond." -Publishers Weekly (???) Critical Acclaim for Keith Devlin's Previous Book Mathematics: The Science of Patterns "A book such as this belongs in the personal library of everyone interested in learning about some of the most subtle and profound works of the human spirit." -American Scientist "Devlin's very attractive book is a well-written attempt to explain mathematics to educated nonmathematicians . the basic ideas are presented in a clear, concise, and easily understood manner. Highly recommended." -Choice "[Devlin] has found an interesting way of exhibiting how mathematics is unified . the author's presentation is a tour de force." -Mathematical Reviews A Selection of the Newbridge Library of Science and Reader's Subscription

About this title

About the Author

KEITH DEVLIN, Ph.D., is Senior Researcher at Stanford University's Center for the Study of Language and Communication. His previous books include Mathematics: The New Golden Age and Mathematics: The Science of Patterns. His television appearances include the BBC/Nova documentary "A Mathematical Mystery Tour." He lives in Moraga, California.

Reviews

In a wide-ranging exploration of the limits of scientific and mathematical thought, Devlin (Mathematics: The Science of Patterns), a mathematician and senior researcher at Stanford University's Center for the Study of Language and Communication, is certain to attract attention?and controversy?with his claim that scientific logic, as exemplified by the philosophy of Descartes, will never enable us to understand the human mind. Artificial Intelligence (AI) is bound to fail, he asserts, for its goal of machine intelligence is an impossible one. Furthermore, he argues, Noam Chomsky's field of Cartesian linguistics is similarly flawed. Though the structure of a human language, like a computer language, can be analyzed in terms of syntactic rules, understanding human communication requires "four key features... that were explicitly ignored in Chomsky's logic-inspired analysis of language: meaning, context, cultural knowledge, [and] the structure of conversation." Given his perceived failure of AI and Chomsky's linguistics, Devlin asks, "what are the possibilities of a science of mind and language, and what kind of a theory should we be looking for?" The answer, he claims, is a "soft mathematics" that does not yet exist but will emerge as an established branch of the field. Readers must grapple with the text and be prepared to argue with the author with Talmudic fervor. AI experts will dispute Devlin's definition of their field and its objectives. Scientists or mathematicians will fill the margins with questions and comments. In the end, whether or not readers have joined Devlin in saying, "Goodbye, Descartes," they will have experienced a fascinating journey to the edges of logical thinking and beyond.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Devlin traces the history of logic, particularly mathematical logic, over two-plus millennia and the shorter history of Chomsky's Cartesian linguistics to explain why at least some "mathematicians and scientists have come to realize that the truly difficult problems of the information age . . . concern ourselves what it is to think, to reason, and to engage in conversation." Despite their remarkable accomplishments, he argues, logic and linguistics don't adequately explain the most characteristic human acts. (Thus, artificial intelligence seems beyond our reach.) Logic and linguistics (and Western culture itself), Devlin maintains, are limited by the eternal "desire to explain knowing how in terms of knowing that, to reduce skills to facts and rules, to explain the composite in terms of its constituents." But this approach ignores important issues; e.g., in linguistics, meaning, context, cultural knowledge, and the structure of conversation. Not a simple read, but accessible enough for the sort of reader likely to be drawn to this subject. Mary Carroll

After years of effort to create a computer that can really think, many workers in the field of artificial intelligence are now beginning to concede it may be impossible. Mathematician and science writer Devlin believes that this is because the computer is a logic machine, and rational thought and human communication involve mental processes that go beyond logic. To convince us, he takes us on a tour of traditional logic, mathematical logic, modern linguistics, congitive science, and theories of communication and information. He concludes with a plea for the development of a new branch of mathematics?soft mathematics?designed to deal with those areas of science that do not fit the traditional paradigm of the hard sciences. An excellent book that should be read by everyone who has ever wondered how we communicate with one another but find it so frustrating to interact with computers.?Harold D. Shane, Baruch Coll., CUNY
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: Wiley
• Publication date: 1997
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0471142166
• ISBN 13: 9780471142164
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 320