Computation and Human Experience

392 Pages·1997·7.24 MB·English

by  Philip E. Agre

This book offers a critical reconstruction of the fundamental ideas and
methods of artificial intelligence research. Through close attention to the
metaphors of AI and their consequences for the field's patterns of success
and failure, it argues for a reorientation of the field away from thought in
the head and toward activity in the world.
By considering computational ideas in a philosophical framework, the
author eases critical dialogue between technology and the humanities and
social sciences. AI can benefit from new understandings of human na-
ture, and in return, it offers a powerful mode of investigation into the
practicalities and consequences of physical realization.

Computation and human experience
Learning in doing: Social, cognitive, and computational
perspectives
GENERAL EDITORS: ROY PEA
JOHN SEELY BROWN
Sociocultural Psychology: Theory and Practice of Doing and Knowing,
edited by Laura M. W. Martin, Katherine Nelson, and Ethel
Tobach
Sociocultural Studies of Mind, edited by James V. Wertsch, Pablo del
Rio, and Amelia Alvarez
The Computer as Medium, edited by Peter Bogh Andersen, Berit
Holmqvist, and Jens F. Jensen
Distributed Cognitions: Psychological and Educational Considerations,
edited by Gavriel Salomon
Understanding Practice: Perspectives on Activity and Context, edited
by Seth Chaiklin and Jean Lave
Street Mathematics and School Mathematics, by Terezinha Nunes,
David William Carraher, and Analucia Dias Schliemann
Situated Learning: Legitimate Peripheral Participation, by Jean Lave
and Etienne Wenger
The Construction Zone: Working for Cognitive Change in School, by
Denis Newman, Peg Griffin, and Michael Cole
Plans and Situated Actions: The Problem of Human Machine
Communication, by Lucy A. Suchman
Mind and Social Activity, edited by Ethel Tobach, Rachel Joffe
Falmagne, Mary B. Parlee, Laura Martin, and Aggie Schribner
Kapelman
Computation and
human experience
PHILIP E. AGRE
University of California, San Diego
CAMBRIDGE
UNIVERSITY PRESS
CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS
Cambridge, New York, Melbourne, Madrid, Cape Town, Singapore, Sao Paulo
Cambridge University Press
The Edinburgh Building, Cambridge CB2 2RU, UK
Published in the United States of America by Cambridge University Press, New York
www. Cambridge. org
Information on this title: www.cambridge.org/9780521384322
© Cambridge University Press 1997
This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception
and to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreements,
no reproduction of any part may take place without
the written permission of Cambridge University Press.
First published 1997
A catalogue record for this publication is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloguing in Publication data
Agre, Philip E.
Computation and human experience / Philip E. Agre.
p. cm. - (Learning in doing)
ISBN 0-521-38432-X (hardback). -ISBN 0-521-38603-9 (pbk.)
1. Artificial Intelligence — Data processing. 2. Human behavior.
I. Title. II. Series.
Q336.A37 1997
006.3 '01 -dc20 96-14826
CIP
ISBN-13 978-0-521-38432-2 hardback
ISBN-10 0-521-38432-X hardback
ISBN-13 978-0-521-38603-6 paperback
ISBN-10 0-521-38603-9 paperback
Transferred to digital printing 2006
Joshu asked Nansen: "What is the path?"
Nansen said: "Everyday life is the path."
Joshu asked: "Can it be studied?"
Nansen said: "If you try to study, you will be far away from it."
Joshu asked: "If I do not study, how can I know it is the path?"
Nansen said: "The path does not belong to the perception world,
neither does it belong to the nonperception world. Cognition is a
delusion and noncognition is senseless. If you want to reach the true
path beyond doubt, place yourself in the same freedom as sky. You
name it neither good nor not-good."
At these words Joshu was enlightened.
Mumons comment: Nansen could melt Joshu's frozen doubts at once
when Joshu asked his questions. I doubt though if Joshu reached the
point that Nansen did. He needed thirty more years of study.
In spring, hundreds of flowers; in autumn, a harvest moon;
In summer, a refreshing breeze; in winter, snow will accompany you.
If useless things do not hang in your mind,
Any season is a good season for you.
Ekai, The Gateless Gate, 1228

Contents
Preface page xi
1 Introduction 1
Activity 1
Planning 5
Why build things? 10
How computation explains 16
Critical orientation 20
Outline 24
2 Metaphor in practice 27
Levels of analysis 27
Language in practice 28
Metaphors in technical work 33
Centers and margins 38
Margins in practice 44
3 Machinery and dynamics 49
Mentalism 49
Inter actionism 52
Machinery and dynamics 57
Interactionist methodology 61
4 Abstraction and implementation 66
Structures of computation 66
A case study: variables 71
vii
viii Contents
Architectural and generative reasoning 80
Generative reasoning and mentalism 85
5 The digital abstraction 89
Digital logic 89
The meaning of circuitry 92
The temporality of computation 96
Embodied computation 103
6 Dependency maintenance 105
Critical technical practice 105
About routines 107
Main ideas of dependency maintenance 113
7 Rule system 124
Using dependencies in a rule system 124
Rule language semantics 126
How it works 130
Incremental updating 136
Advanced rule writing 139
8 Planning and improvisation 142
The idea of planning 142
Troubles with planning 145
Planning and execution 150
Improvisation 156
9 Running arguments 160
From plans to arguments 160
Argument and centralization 166
How running arguments work 171
10 Experiments with running arguments 179
Motivation 179
Demonstration 181
Patterns of transfer 191