# Models, etc.

**URL:** <http://discourse.iapct.org/t/models-etc/7170>\
**Category:** CSG1995\
**Created:** [June 23, 1995, 3:41pm UTC](http://discourse.iapct.org/t/models-etc/7170 "1995-06-23T15:41:36Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![\_Avery\_Andrews](http://discourse.iapct.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/_/848f3c/32.png) [@\_Avery\_Andrews](http://discourse.iapct.org/u/_Avery_Andrews)\
**Post date:** [June 23, 1995, 3:41pm UTC](http://discourse.iapct.org/t/models-etc/7170/1 "1995-06-23T15:41:36Z")

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[Avery Andrews 950623]

(Hans Blom & others, various posting)

I haven't been able to follow the model-based control discussion too closely,  
but I certainly don't grasp why there is an argument: a `world-model'  
\*is\* a kind of perception, even if rather heavily processed; surely the  
only significant questions are (a) what kind of processing are required  
to get particular jobs done (which Hans would surely know a lot more  
about in his field, than we would) (b) what kinds are in fact employed  
by living systems. And there's no sense in being doctrinaire about this  
either. If bees can use integrators to control modelled distance  
from a food source, surely we can managed some reasonably sophisticated  
stuff too.

On another topic, alongside of reorganization and `reinforcement', there's  
the problem of one-shot learning. Earlier in the week I learned that  
the standard capture-release-and-recapture method of monitoring the  
movements of lizards doesn't work for the striped legless lizard  
Delma Impar (a local threatened species with a penchant for living in  
places where people want to put shopping centers), presumably because  
they have some kind of perceptual or cognitive ability such that when they  
fall into a standard pitfall trap once, they learn something that  
enables them not to fall into one again. There's no reason to think that  
they're reptilian rocket scientists, so presumably it's perceptual, but  
it still seems to work pretty reliably from a single experience.

Avery.Andrews@anu.edu.au