Computational Cognitive Modeling - Reading Assignment

The Unconscious Juggling of Mental Objects

12 Question/Answer Pairs

1. What is the main typical theme of the Preface 2, and why is it of significance?
Answer: The main typical theme of the Preface 2 is to discuss the concept of "juggling" mental objects. The author talks about the process of solving anagrams. He equates the letters of the words as objects that can be juggled in order to solve the anagram. This is significant because it discusses the mental process of solving an anagram. The brain is very mysterious and hard to understand. I believe researching how the brain solves problems could be very useful.


2. What is a "glom"?
Answer: A "glom" is the product of the grouping of mentally juggled letters. A "glom" can be an actual English word or a group of letters that resemble an English word.


3. What are the two well defined phases of "glomming"?
Answer: The first defined phase of "glomming" is when the letters mentally thrown in the air. The second defined phase is when the letters come down and form a "glom".


4. Describe the analogy that Hofstadter likes to use in when discussing "virtual "objects" - objects that float on neural hardware but that are certainly not easily describable in terms of neurons or networks of neurons.
Answer: The analogy that Hofstadter uses to describe a virtual mental object is a ball in a video game. He compares it to a ball in a video game because it is not a real physical object. A ball in a video game is not a tangible object but you know that is there and that it exists.


5. In reference to the glomming operation in Jumble problem solving, Hofstadter asks "Why work so hard to model such a frivolous and atypical cognitive activity?". Do your best to summarize his answer in a compelling manner.
Answer: I think understanding the brain and how it solves problems can help can help with figuring out artificial intelligence problems such as asking something like Siri a question. Knowing how the human brain works will help program a computer. brain.


6. To your mind, what is the biggest, most significant, most transcendent idea presented in the short section titled "Jumbo versus Brute Force."
Answer: I found it interesting that highly mathematical rapid-search techniques are considered the antithesis of cognitive models and that a brute force approach is more accepted. After thinking about this, I realized that a brute force approach is probably considered better since it is modeled after how a human would solve an anagram problem. A mathematical approach might be very clever and even faster but it doesn't reflect how a human would solve the problem.


7. In 50 words or so describe the Hearsay II project.
Answer: The HearSay II project is based on the idea of a "parallel architecture in which bottom-up and top-down processing could coexist and influence each other." (Hofstadter, p. 94) This project involved invoking Knowledge Sources (KS) by ensuring a complicated set of conditions were met.


8. What is Hofstadter's relationship to "that fateful footnote" that he reproduces on page 92.
Answer: While reading a technical paper about preconditions of a KS he discovers a footnote that he founds to be quite powerful. To Hofstadter, the footnote describes how parallel computing works. In order for a KS to be invoked a precondition must be met. However, in order to meet those preconditions the preconditions of the precondition must be met. There can be many preconditions before hitting the final precondition to invoke the KS. The fascinating part is that these preconditions are simultaneously being checked and bottom-most condition is constantly running. This brings in the idea of parallel computing.


9. What is a "parallel terraced scan"?
Answer: The analogy that Hofstadter gave in the book is the ritual of a "rush" which is an event that takes place in many college campuses in the U.S. In short, this analogy demonstrates how a "rushee" is given about 22 sororities to choose from after narrowing it down to 16 she has a now smaller set to choose from which makes her choose her potential sorority more wisely. When she has a smaller amount of sororities to choose from, she amps up her scrutinee. Along with the rushee being scrutinous, the residents of the sororities are simultaneously being scrutinous. They too increase their level of scrutinee when they have fewer rushees to choose from. This analogy demonstrates what a parallel terraced scan is. This goes back to the discussion of preconditions of Knowledge Sources and certain preconditions have to be met before reaching the next precondition. The bottom-most precondition does not take much time to be met since it has a lot of "rushees" to scrutinize. But when top-most preconditions are being scrutinized it takes a lot of time for it to be solved since there are fewer "rushees" to choose from. This is how I interpreted the strategy of a parallel terraced scan.


10. Identify and define the parallel terraced scan that Hofstadter identifies in the preface.
Answer: Hofstadter uses the word "weeknight" to show an example of a parallel scan. He breaks down the word "weeknight" into different pieces and shows how it can be interpreted and changed.


11. Think of an example of a parallel terraced scan from "real life" that is not mentioned in the preface. Describe it!
Answer: Since I am about to be a college graduate, I am going to use the job search example to discuss a parallel terraced scan. When one is beginning their job search they have a vast array of jobs to apply to especially in the fall semester since that is usually the time that jobs are recruiting for software engineering roles. Software engineering jobs usually offer a plethora of jobs and usually leaves the applicant with a lot of choices. On the other side, the recruiters/hiring managers also have a lot of applicants to choose from and their selection process might not be as selective. After picking the candidates they would like to interview they then have a smaller amount to choose from. If the interviews of some candidates goes well they then have a smaller amount to choose from which makes them scrutinize their candidates even more since they have a smaller selection pool. Upon the last set of interviews they will have a smaller amount of candidates leaving them to be the most scrutinous. On the flip side, when a candidate finally hears back from companies that want to interview them their selection choice is even smaller. Finally, when they receive job offers they have an even smaller set of choices to make albeit harder since they are down to their final decision. This embodies what a parralel terraced scan is because it shows two parties simultaneously making choices and with each decision being made the scrutinee of the decision is increased and the number of choices are decreased.


12. Hofstadter recounts his thought that his work on Jumbo implicitly subsumes a very fundamental and everyday cognitive task - namely, word perception. Present his thoughts on this, giving a couple contrasting letter chunking examples of your own process.
Answer: The first word that I would like to break down is "breakfast". To a proficient English reader the word "breakfast" would not be interpreted as "break" "fast". We instantly read the word "break fast" as "brekfast" because of the fast processing of our brain.
The second word is "weekend". A proficient English reader's brain will read this word as "week end" and not read it as "weakened" and also not as "wee kend". Since the brain already knows the word week it will not group the word "weekend" like the previous grouping example. The third word is "microwave". Our brains know to separate the word "microwave" as "micro wave" and not group it as "mic rowave" or "mi crowave" which if sounded out would sound the same but since we know that "micro" and "wave" are two different English words our brains know not to do that.