The Knowledge Illusion part 8

This post is on the book The Knowledge Illusion by Steven Sloman (cognitive scientist and professor at Brown University) and Phillip Fernbach (cognitive scientist and professor of marketing at Colorado's Leeds School of business).

This post is the eighth in a series of sixteen that address The Knowledge Illusion and unless otherwise noted all quotes are from The Knowledge Illusion. I recommend reading all sixteen posts in order.

I have written on numerous other books on psychology, social psychology, critical thinking, cognitive dissonance theory and related topics already but discovered this one and feel it plays a complimentary and very needed role. It helps to explain a huge number of "hows" and "whys" regarding the other subjects I mentioned, all of the subjects.

In chapter five, Thinking with Our Bodies and the World, the authors of The Knowledge Illusion explain how those two factors help us in thought.

The authors contrast cognitive science as the study of human intelligence against artificial intelligence which is the study of how to build a machine that can behave in intelligent ways.

From the 1940s to 1980s there was a focus on individual computers. A lot of information and processing abilities were put into computers so they could rapidly come up with answers to many questions.

A funny thing happened on the way to superintelligent computers. We never got there. In 2003 Marvin Minsky, one of the cofounders of the AI lab at MIT remarked on how we never developed computer intelligence with common sense.

We have made computers that are good at taking in some kinds of information and performing calculations but not good at other things. We have computers that are good as cash registers and calculators and even playing chess or even helping a doctor. I have seen a little on computers that can compare scans of a patient against a vast library of scans that were further verified to help a doctor to know if a growth is cancerous for example.

But we are nowhere near where we thought we would be.

The authors give the example of how a human being with their mind, probably the vast majority of human minds of adults, can hear a statement or the poem Casey at the Bat and know what the poem means. To do this you need some understanding of the rules of baseball, and you need to understand that if he gets a hit Casey will go to a base or possibly around all all the bases. You need to understand the hometown crowd will get excited and cheer. The fans of the other team would not cheer, and neither would guys selling peanuts.

A lot of things affect each other and affect the emotions of participants and spectators. To understand this a computer would need to have all this information and somehow in its algorithms also have the emotional associations attached to concepts like a human does. As humans our emotions and thoughts are linked and prompt each other largely in a hidden and automatic way through subconscious processes.

But those processes help us to understand other people because we often see them as similar to our own without a conscious thought.

For computer programmers to know how to even start to program something to handle this or simulate it is a challenge they don't even know how to start to take on. We simulate all the people and emotions and possible reactions from just a couple lines of the poem.

Another problem is that a human being can go for a walk in the woods on uneven terrain with sticks and stones and changing angles, no problem. For computer to run a robot that can do this would require a tremendous number of sensors and calculations for each step taken with an evaluation of the result then a new series of calculations and this would take a tremendous amount of memory and capacity.

Rodney Brooks worked as a computer science professor at MIT in the 1980s. He was part of a team that tried to simulate the way nature builds animals. It builds one part for a function and builds others for other functions and adds to them over time.

He would work with his team and build a robot that was pretty good at walking. It would have tiny processors in each limb to calculate the right action for that limb. No central computer was handling every calculation.

A similar robot that has separate competent parts that combine to function well is the Roomba. It has parts for propulsion, a sensor to get it to turn from collisions and it has a vacuum. It is capable of vacuuming a floor with no big plan.

This kind of intelligence is called embodied intelligence. The environment provides the information to guide the robots.

we similarly get information from the environment. And we cheat in a way. In research following eye movements it has been shown that we often build a model of our environment and if we were to focus in on a series of words in text for example, we to a great degree assume the rest of the world is staying the same. We might hear or feel something that startles us, but for the most part this assuming the world is still there works out much of the time.

"This assumption that the world is behaving normally gives people a giant crutch. It means that we don't have to remember everything because the information is stored in the world. If I need to know something, all I have to do is look at it. If I need to know what the sentence was at the top of the page, I don't have to remember it, I just have to look at the top of the page. As one of the researchers doing these experiments said, "the visual environment functions as a sort of outside memory store""
(Page 95)

We just assume we are constantly perceiving most of our environment constantly but in reality we focus on a tiny fraction of the environment at one time and create a composite picture from memory. Where ever you look things conform to expectations when looked at.

One experiment the authors suggest is closing your eyes and reconstructing the world around you then adding everything above your normal line of vision.

I got to have some experience with this because my wife is about a half foot shorter than me. I noticed that she doesn't seem to notice things more than about two inches above her eyes. We have a dog that will eat or tear up lots of things if she can get them so we have a lot of things we have moved to my height or higher. My wife forgets about bananas that are on top of a cabinet for example and has to throw out the snack she bought for herself. The change from eye level or out on a table to above eye level renders things invisible for her.

We use the world to help us to observe and remember it. We also use it to guide us. In trying to catch a ball in baseball we don't get out a pad and run calculations, instead we try to have the angle of the ball increase as it comes towards us, we might move towards the ball or away but if we move quickly enough then we can get to the ball before it lands and attempt to catch it. That is why you see the outfielder run into the wall. He is trying to move to intersect the ball.

Actual experiments have confirmed this is how professional baseball players catch the ball. They move to increase the angle of the ball between themselves and the ground.

We also use the world to help us navigate as when we drive if both sides of a lane are passing us at the same rate we are staying in the middle. We do the same thing with doorways.

Actual experiments with driving simulators and virtual reality have shown that making one side of the lane move faster or one side of a doorway move faster makes people go off course and go into one side. We use little tricks that have focused attention with assumptions about the environment to make it so we can do a lot of things by just focusing on a little bit of the world to guide us.

We also use our bodies to guide us. In an experiment, people were shown pictures of items like watering cans and utensils and asked to indicate if the object was upright or not by pressing a button. Sounds simple. The researchers varied just a couple elements in the experiment. They sometimes required participants to use their right or left hand and sometimes put the handle of the object on the right or left side. This resulted in a quicker response when the handle and the hand were on the same side. It shows that we subconsciously get ready to identify if we can use objects in an automatic way aligning hands and objects. The delay meant that when you are ready to grab something with a particular hand and it is upright but not in the right position for that available hand, it takes a little longer to decide how to proceed.

Another study showed that acting out a scene is a more effective way to remember it than other techniques.

it has been found that arithmetic goes better with an external aid like paper or a blackboard. Our number system is based on ten and that matches the number of fingers a person usually has available to count on.

Many activities are easier with a physical aid. It is easier to work out how to write or spell something with pen and paper than without it and easier to work out how to play a guitar with one than without it.

"We even use emotional reactions as a kind of memory. When we react, with pleasure, pain, or fear to an event, we discover what to pay attention to and what to avoid. Antonio Damasio, a neuroscientist at the University of Southern California, called these reactions somatic markers from the Greek soma, meaning body. Our bodies produce feelings to make us aware and warn us. When an option is pleasing, we have a positive affective reaction - a good feeling.  That's why we feel good in a French patisserie. Our bodies are trying to draw our attention to all the delectables within sight. " (Page 103)

"When an option is displeasing, we have a negative reaction like disgust or fear. The reaction tells us to avoid the option because it might be infectious, dangerous in some other way, or just annoying. A well-placed disgust response tells us to get away from whatever caused it." ( Page 103)

Now, sometimes emotional responses are good. We panic and catch a child that is about to walk into traffic or slam on the breaks and avoid hitting a car or deer. We might be absent -mindedly walking down a street at night and realize someone is behind us because a flash of panic brings our attention to it.

But emotion guiding us isn't always beneficial. We might feel fear or disgust about people and not use good judgment in dealing with them.

Many historians note that the portrayal of people to be scapegoats includes depicting them as disgusting, like vermin and filth, and as something of an existential threat to be feared.

The path of genocide quite often has a phase in which the propaganda of entire races, religions, sexual identities and other broad groups as both disgusting and something to be feared is used. This propaganda often has outright lies and impossible stories. The fact that it lacks credible evidence and contradicts good sense is irrelevant. This kind of information is meant to appeal to emotions and not to withstand vigorous intellectual scrutiny.

Robert Jay Lifton recognized this as dispensing of existence in his right criteria for thought reform.

Dr. Robert J. Lifton's Eight Criteria for Thought Reform

1. Milieu Control.  This involves the control of information and communication both within the environment and, ultimately, within the individual, resulting in a significant degree of isolation from society at large.
2. Mystical Manipulation.  There is manipulation of experiences that appear spontaneous but in fact were planned and orchestrated by the group or its leaders in order to demonstrate divine authority or spiritual advancement or some special gift or talent that will then allow the leader to reinterpret events, scripture, and experiences as he or she wishes. 
3. Demand for Purity.  The world is viewed as black and white and the members are constantly exhorted to conform to the ideology of the group and strive for perfection.  The induction of guilt and/or shame is a powerful control device used here. 
4. Confession.  Sins, as defined by the group, are to be confessed either to a personal monitor or publicly to the group.  There is no confidentiality; members' "sins," "attitudes," and "faults" are discussed and exploited by the leaders. 
5. Sacred Science.  The group's doctrine or ideology is considered to be the ultimate Truth, beyond all questioning or dispute.  Truth is not to be found outside the group.  The leader, as the spokesperson for God or for all humanity, is likewise above criticism. 
6. Loading the Language.  The group interprets or uses words and phrases in new ways so that often the outside world does not understand.  This jargon consists of thought-terminating clich�s, which serve to alter members' thought processes to conform to the group's way of thinking. 
7. Doctrine over person.  Member's personal experiences are subordinated to the sacred science and any contrary experiences must be denied or reinterpreted to fit the ideology of the group. 
8. Dispensing of existence.  The group has the prerogative to decide who has the right to exist and who does not.  This is usually not literal but means that those in the outside world are not saved, unenlightened, unconscious and they must be converted to the group's ideology.  If they do not join the group or are critical of the group, then they must be rejected by the  members.  Thus, the outside world loses all credibility.  In conjunction, should any member leave the group, he or she must be rejected also.  (Lifton, 1989)

Here is a further quote on dispensing of existence from a blog at Freedom of Mind.

Finally, the eighth, and perhaps the most general and significant of these characteristics is what I call the “dispensing of existence.” This principle is usually metaphorical. But if one has an absolute or totalistic vision of truth, then those who have not seen the light—have not embraced that truth, are in some way in the shadows—are bound up with evil, tainted, and do not have the right to exist. 
Robert Jay Lifton

Robert Jay Lifton made it clear the ultimate expression of this is genocide.

Genocide Watch lists ten stages of genocide.

Here is dehumanization.

DEHUMANIZATION: One group denies the humanity of the other group. Members of it are equated with animals, vermin, insects or diseases. Dehumanization overcomes the normal human revulsion against murder. At this stage, hate propaganda in print and on hate radios is used to vilify the victim group. In combating this dehumanization, incitement to genocide should not be confused with protected speech. Genocidal societies lack constitutional protection for countervailing speech, and should be treated differently than democracies. Local and international leaders should condemn the use of hate speech and make it culturally unacceptable. Leaders who incite genocide should be banned from international travel and have their foreign finances frozen. Hate radio stations should be shut down, and hate propaganda banned. Hate crimes and atrocities should be promptly punished. End quote

As we can easily see genocide has the use of disgust (something Jon Atack pointed out to me) and fear as a key ingredients. 

We use our brains, bodies, the environment around us and our feelings all together to guide us. 

Part of the mystery of how individuals navigate through the same environment while being so ignorant is explained.  Our  individual knowledge is limited but we have many things to help us.