Putnam's Diagonal Argument and the Impossibility of a Universal Learning Machine.

Putnam construed the aim of Carnap's program of inductive logic as the specification of a "universal learning machine," and presented a diagonal proof against the very possibility of such a thing. Yet the ideas of Solomonoff and Levin lead to a mathematical foundation of precisely those aspects of C...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Publicado en:Erkenntnis Vol. 84; no. 3; pp. 633 - 657
Autor principal: Sterkenburg, Tom F.
Formato: Artículo
Publicado: Springer Nature Jun2019
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Acceso en línea:Ver este registro en EBSCOhost
Descripción
Sumario:Putnam construed the aim of Carnap's program of inductive logic as the specification of a "universal learning machine," and presented a diagonal proof against the very possibility of such a thing. Yet the ideas of Solomonoff and Levin lead to a mathematical foundation of precisely those aspects of Carnap's program that Putnam took issue with, and in particular, resurrect the notion of a universal mechanical rule for induction. In this paper, I take up the question whether the Solomonoff–Levin proposal is successful in this respect. I expose the general strategy to evade Putnam's argument, leading to a broader discussion of the outer limits of mechanized induction. I argue that this strategy ultimately still succumbs to diagonalization, reinforcing Putnam's impossibility claim.