Society of Mind

The Society of Mind is the book and theory of natural intelligence as written and developed by Marvin Minsky.

Minsky's Thesis
In a step-by-step process, Minsky constructs a thesis for a way in which human intelligence in all its complexity can be built up, layer by layer, from the interactions of simple parts called agents, who are themselves mindless.

The Book
The book was the first comprehensive discription of Minksy's Society of Mind theory, and was published over 10 years after he began developing the theory in the early 1970s.

The book was also made into a CD-ROM version.

It is composed of 270 self-contained essays which are divided into 30 general chapters.

In the process of explaining his society of mind thesis, Minksy introduces a wide range of ideas and concepts. Minsky develops theories about how processes such as language, memory, and learning work but he also covers concepts such as consciousness, the sense of self, and free will; Because of this many view Society of Mind as a work of philosophy.

The book wasn't written to prove anything specific about AI or cognitive science, and doesn't reference physical brain structures. Instead it is a collection of ideas about how the mind and thinking work on the conceptual level.

The Theory
Minsky first started developing the theory with Seymour Papert in the early 1970s. Minsky says that the biggest source of ideas about the theory came from his work in trying to create a machine that uses a robotic arm, a video camera, and a computer to build with children's blocks.

External links and references

 * Book by Minsky, Marvin The Society of Mind ISBN 0671657135 c1986
 * MIT article Examining the Society of Mind