Issues in symbol processing

The notion of mind as symbol processor is fundamental to AI and congitive science, but some connectionists are now arguing against it. Eliminative connectionism challenges the validity of formal symbol manipulation as a level of mental description. We review some of the claims that have been made, and argue that most connectionist models, especially those constructed by learning algorithms, are operating at the level of pattern classifiers. Their (rather limited) success using non-symbolic representations demonstrates that they have not yet even approached the tasks which symbol processing models attempt to solve. Continued progress in connectionist research may require reimplementation rather than rejection of the symbolic level. Proceedings of the 1987 IEEE International Conference on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics. Alexandria, Virginia. October 20-23, 1987. Issues in Symbol Processing David S. Touretzky Computer Science Department Carnegie Mellon University Pittsburgh, PA 15213