Title: The grounding problem in language and reality

Abstract: Philosophy of language has long struggled with the symbol-grounding problem of meaning. If symbols are only defined relationally, that is, in terms of each other, then how do they ever mean something? Learning that ∫ connects ∩ to ₺ seems to say little about the meaning of ∫, ∩ and ₺.

A similar grounding problem exists for algorithms. Searle highlighted this in the Chinese Room thought experiment. Computationally transforming meaningless input (0’s and 1’s) into meaningless output (other 0’s and 1’s) seems insufficient to generate meaning.

For both symbols and algorithms it could be argued that consciousness is needed to infuse grounding into the system. Recent evidence suggests that these issues may not be entirely philosophical. Surprisingly, in the context of quantum physics, it has recently been shown that the description of unmeasured reality always requires complex numbers – complex numbers contain the square root of -1 and must be transformed to become a real number. Yet, observables, such as mass, charge and position, can be described entirely with real numbers. This suggests that unobserved reality is “pre-real” and needs the infusion of an observation to become actual.

In the current talk I will discuss how the seemingly unrelated grounding problems between language, algorithms and reality may, in fact, be related. Moreover, I will outline how this may lead to testable predictions in these domains. This may have empirical consequences for the seemingly unrelated fields of quantum physics and large language models.

Bio: Yair Pinto is an assistant Professor in Cognitive Neuroscience at the University of Amsterdam with a background in Physics (MSc) and Cognitive Psychology (PhD). He has received several high-profile grants both European (a Dutch Rubicon grant, a European Marie-Curie grant) and American (a large Templeton grant). He has published his work in many prestigious journals, among them JEP:General, Psychological Science and Brain. His main interests are visual perception, consciousness, split-brain patients and free will.