Understanding Computers and Cognition A New Foundation for Design

by Winograd, Terry; Flores, Fernando

• ISBN13: 9780201112979
• ISBN10: 0201112973
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1987-01-01
• Publisher: Addison-Wesley Professional

Summary

Understanding Computers and Cognition presents an important and controversial new approach to understanding what computers do and how their functioning is related to human language, thought, and action. While it is a book about computers, Understanding Computers and Cognition goes beyond the specific issues of what computers can or can't do. It is a broad-ranging discussion exploring the background of understanding in which the discourse about computers and technology takes place. Understanding Computers and Cognition is written for a wide audience, not just those professionals involved in computer design or artificial intelligence. It represents an important contribution to the ongoing discussion about what it means to be a machine, and what it means to be human. Book jacket.

Author Biography

Terry Winograd is in the department of Computer Science at Stanford University Fernando Flores is now President of Logonet, Inc., an educational corporation, and Chairman of Action Technologies, a software development company

Table of Contents

Preface	p. xi
Acknowledgments	p. xiii
Theoretical Background
Introduction	p. 3
The question of design	p. 4
The role of tradition	p. 7
Our path	p. 8
The rationalistic tradition	p. 14
The rationalistic orientation	p. 14
Language, truth, and the world	p. 17
Decision making and problem solving	p. 20
Cognitive science	p. 23
Understanding and Being	p. 27
Hermeneutics	p. 27
Understanding and ontology	p. 30
An illustration of thrownness	p. 33
Breaking down and readiness-to-hand	p. 36
Cognition as a biological phenomenon	p. 38
The closure of the nervous system	p. 41
Autopoiesis, evolution, and learning	p. 44
The cognitive domain	p. 46
Consensual domains	p. 48
The observer and description	p. 50
Domains of explanation	p. 52
Language, listening, and commitment	p. 54
Listening in a background	p. 54
Meaning, commitment, and speech acts	p. 58
Objectivity and tradition	p. 60
Recurrence and formalization	p. 64
Breakdown, language, and existence	p. 68
Towards a new orientation	p. 70
Cognition and being in the world	p. 70
Knowledge and representation	p. 72
Pre-understanding and background	p. 74
Language and action	p. 76
Breakdown and the ontology of design	p. 77
Computation, Thought, and Language
Computers and representation	p. 83
Programming as representation	p. 84
Levels of representation	p. 86
Can computers do more than you tell them to do?	p. 90
Computation and intelligence	p. 93
Why do we ask?	p. 93
Intelligence as rational problem solving	p. 95
The phenomenon of blindness	p. 97
What about learning and evolution?	p. 100
Can pigs have wings?	p. 104
Understanding language	p. 107
Artificial intelligence and language understanding	p. 107
The problem of background	p. 111
Understanding as pattern recognition	p. 115
What does it mean to understand?	p. 119
Current directions in artificial intelligence	p. 125
The forking of the paths	p. 126
Expert systems	p. 131
The fifth generation computer system	p. 133
Design
Management and conversation	p. 143
Management and decision making	p. 144
Decision making and resolution	p. 147
Organizations as networks of commitments	p. 150
Decision support systems	p. 152
Tools for conversation	p. 157
Using computers: A direction for design	p. 163
A background for computer design	p. 164
A design example	p. 167
Systematic domains	p. 174
Technology and transformation	p. 177
Bibliography	p. 181
Name Index	p. 191
Subject Index	p. 194
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