Linguistic inspiraton for Commonsense

Consider this sentence - John gave a ball to Jack. John -- gave a ball to -- Jack. This association between John and Jack has an explicit connector - “gave a ball to”. All sentences connect 2 or more entities with a set of words present between them as the link between them. But what about the words which immediately succeed each other? There is no word in between them. The connector between them is the commonsense in the story conveyed by the sentence. Consider the successive word-pairs - John --?-- gave. The Connector is : ‘with his hands’. The Connector comes between John and gave or rather connects John and gave. John (the body) and the physical act of giving (which is “physically further” to it) have this link between them. Gave --?-- ball. Connector : ‘supported by his palms’. The Connector connects giving and the ball by being the link between them. The physical act of giving (the jerking of the arms from John towards Jack) and the ball have this between them (the supporting palms). Ball --?-- to. Connector : ‘moved/transferred’. Moved comes as a connector between ball and the ‘to’wardness toward Jack. ‘The ball’ and ‘the ‘sense of it being directed to someone’ contain ‘it moved’ between them. To --?--Jack. Connector : ‘into Jack’s hands’. Jack's hands come between the pointing direction of ‘towardness’ and ‘Jack’ - the body - which is further to it, as the connector. That - 1) John gave it with his hands, 2) the ball was supported by his palms 3) the ball moved/trans-located 4) the ball went into Jack’s hands - are the commonsense associated with this sentence, deriving from a Linguistic “source” as shown above.

Commonsense thinking instincts

Consider this sentence - A gave a ball to B. Commonsense says that – now the ball is no longer with A. This is not explicitly stated in the sentence but something that occurs to you. How? You compare two states – A having given the ball to B (which the sentence makes you understand), with an earlier state – A about to give the ball i.e. A having the ball. Why were you inspired to or happen to compare the 2 states? Because you noticed a change in the image of A’s hands – ‘no ball after giving’ and ‘previously having the ball’. How did you notice the change in the image of A’s hands? You saw A’s hands (without a ball) and were REMINDED of a SIMILAR (with a little difference) image of A’s hands having the ball earlier. And why did you notice the change in the image of A’s hands? Well that’s one of the instincts of thinking – noticing changes in things, if and when they occur. Suppose you see a painting on a wall. Then you turn around and after some time turn back to see that the painting is not there, you may/will instinctively remark – where’s the painting gone? You were responsive to or were sensitive in catching a change. Now the only question which remains is – why did you notice A’s hands when the story of the scene is moving towards the ball being with B? Well, you just “looked around”, which is again an instinct of thinking. You would not be able to justify this with a solid reason (as to why did you, after following the ball to B’s hands, looked BACK). If you see some event happening somewhere on the street (say an accident or a crash) you will for some moments also ‘look around’ the car; whereas here there is an even stronger motivation to look around because you are having a look at an earlier-mentioned part of the whole story. If you see a movie changing focus from X to Y over some time, it is very likely that it would occur to you – What happened to X then? This example highlights some of the traits of commonsense thinking – noticing changes, comparing current and previous states of something, being reminded of something similar from something, and lastly going back to a previous state in the first place – all for no apparent preconceived reason, but just on instinct.

COMMONSENSE DEFAULT EMPHASIS -

Every sentence contains multiple items, which make up the total information to be conveyed to the listener. But some item is “critical”. Critical because that is the end-point, or the bottomline amongst the information that the speaker wants to convey. For example, when someone says the sentence – ‘water bodies on maps are shown in blue’, it appeals to us via commonsense that the most important thing which he wants to convey is ‘BLUE’. That’s the endpoint emphasis. Of course he wants to talk ABOUT water bodies and talk WITH REFERENCE TO maps. But somehow it is clear to us that the intended point of the sentence is ‘blue’ – that they are shown in blue. Consider another sentence – John is the culprit. Here it appears that people were trying to identify who is the culprit and this information came from somewhere/someone that John is the one. So the intended point of information in this sentence is ‘JOHN’. This point is also important in the cognitive regard because more often than not, this intended point is the point from where the thought occurred/began in the mind which later became the expressed given sentence. ‘John’ struck someone (in the thought) as the answer to the mystery of who is the culprit, and he later expressed the sentence – John is the culprit. This is the commonsense story behind the sentence. Another point here is that we involuntarily imagine contexts from sentences. This imagined context is principally inspired from this intended point of information. For example, if you hear -John sat on the office chair for the first time, the intended point of information that you automatically sense is ‘the first time’ (and very close in importance comes the part ‘office chair’) which makes up build up a background/context that John is appointed to some new position/post and today is the beginning. So we see three concepts about a sentence, intertwined here – the intended point of information, which is related to (inspires) the imagined context of the occurrence of the speech by the listener and the inception of the thought in the speaker’s mind which was later converted into the spoken sentence.

Why do we make commonsense assumptions?

Consider this sentence: Jack opened the door. Whenever we are given a sentence we make commonsense assumptions about it - things that are not explicitly stated in the sentence. But why do we make them? A part of what makes a door a door is its surroundings. (Just like the meaning of a sentence resides partly in the surrounding text). A sentence tells a story. To imagine anything about a story, we need to imagine the individual elements with something in each one’s surroundings. The way the words of a sentence fuse with each other (to create meaning) contributes to these surroundings of these individual elements. The above sentence has a door. So that’s just a rectangular wooden piece which is a door. But “opening the door” makes it mandatory to imagine a frame or a wall around it since you cannot “open a door” which is just an isolated wooden rectangle standing on the ground. Hence come the other assumptions like John was wearing clothes, that he opened it with his hands, he was looking at the door while opening it etc. Another point- sometimes what happens is that we imagine a context for the sentence. This happens because once all the risings of the words have been done or the sentence has been fused fully, there is a need for a surrounding for the sentence as a whole, which manifests as the context. In other words, the earlier part refers to what can be called internal or sub-contexts whereas the latter can be referred to as external context.

English-to-reality-adjustment = commonsense

Consider the English sentence - John got wet in the rains. Consider the fragment - ‘John got wet’. It implies ‘water on John’s body’. How do we make this cognition? Water is a new word on the implied side (not present on the left hand side), and so is body. How does the “expression” ‘John got wet’ BECOME ‘Water on John’s body’. There is so much fitting in and adjustment of commonsense concepts here. Firstly, here are the chunks - 1) John = A male human being. 2) Got wet = covered with water. 3) In the rains = inside the rain streams. Now, English-to-Reality adjustment = commonsense. Chunks (1+ 2) --- includes the commonsense---> 1) “covered with water” means some physical body covered with water 2) John taken as John’s body. Chunks (2 + 3) ----includes the commonsense---> 1) Rain is water 2) water wets. Chunk (3) ---includes the commonsense---> surrounded on and around by rain streams (among other possible interpretations like say, “John being inside the rain streams/drops”). So real experience of all these concepts is also critical, especially being really under/in the rains to understand the phrase “in the rains” as “under and surrounded by rain streams”.

The “real” medium of commonsense

Suppose your friend told you - I gave a book to John. You will make commonsense implications from the above sentence, like for example - which book did he give to John? Whose (author) book was it? etc. But what made you believe or assume in the first place that the book was a standard book (one with a title, author, price, publisher etc.)? It is the whole medium that you are in, experiencing that reality (the data) which puts you in a certain frame of mind of making fundamental assumptions about everything that you see in that medium. It can be very indirect. Because you know a real, typical human being (your friend) gave a book to another real, typical human being that you subconsciously believed that the item given was also a real, typical, commonsense-satisfying, standard entity i.e. the book. You were convinced of the standardness of the experience (friend telling you about his friend) and that effect spilled over onto the whole data (including the book), i.e. you assumed the book to be a standard one from the surrounding standard scenario of two real, typical human beings transferring something between them. Per se there is no need of believing that the book was a standard one (it could have been one without a publisher or without any cost or whatever - say a memoir of Marvin Minsky prepard by his students and distributed in the department). But because you are “in that medium of ‘reality’ which you are convinced of being so in by the mental registry of the fact that you are actually listening to some real person narrating something to you in person, and where you know that thus commonsense applies, that you apply that state of mind to the book also. Using commonsense is something like “being immersed in the medium, at various root-levels”.

Commonsense

What is commonsense? A gave a ball to B. Commonsense tells us that A gave it with his hands into B's hands. This comes from ball, actually from 'gave ball' But that raises the point that what is the status of 'gave ball' per se? That is what is 'gave ball' perceived as before the "hands come to the mind"? Because gave ball has to be understood as something, to convert it into or bring into mind the hands! I think it is just a tiny video clip of a slight jerk going away (to whatever in the surroundings). Such a clip because the symbolic commonality in all givings is that something "moves/goes away from the giver, to the taker". That what I think is the first impression of the linguistic entity - 'gave'. So the first impression of 'gave a ball' is that a "ball (perceived as what a ball is like) goes away". When the sentence is completely heard, the fact that A and B are 2 people in the scene gets noticed (after the B at the end is heard). In round two, there is a attempted rearrangment of the consumed entities to construct the first mechanical model (who's there? whats where? what goes to/becomes what?) of the scene. It is after this, that is that the entities have fallen in place in some mould, that the above commonsense should flash from "person, giving, a (small) object, to another person" collectively. What does this tell us about commonsense? Even commonsense knowledge asssumption over a given data is a "reasoning process". The fact that a small object was given, the fact that a person gave it and the fact that another person was given it, all contribute to the assumption/imagination of the so called commonsense knowledge. Whats the difference between commonsense knowledge and commonsense thinking? Firstly, call it commonsense reasoning or not, there is a thinking process to build the / to make occur the commonsense knowledge assumption. And then later there is obviously commonsense reasoning to weave commonsense assumptions/facts into something.

Basis of commonsense knowledge assumptions

What is commonsense? A gave a ball to B. Who has the ball now? B. If you are going to someone’s house, you expect there to be air in the hall (and rooms). You don't expect nitrous oxide or carbon monoxide. This is a commonsense assumption you make. This is very very plausible. But what is the basis of this? Statistics (all houses have air in them)? Or Experience (all houses you have been to have had air in them)? Or sheer “Worldliness” (things being the same in this world, across places)? Variables are samples of constants. Constants are common across entities, variables change. A cricketer is a constant, Sachin Tendulkar is a variable. How do you know which is a constant across scenarios? There are two levels of perceiving data - looking at the constant (general) and looking at the variable (specific). And these are levels - the same thing can be a general or a specific according to which level you are looking at the data at. A bag with some name (say, rotary club) written on it is general (bag) as well as a specific (a carrier example). Rotary club bag is a specific (of the bag) as well as a generality of different designs of rotary club bags. The word you use to represent something is critical. That determines its level. Empirically speaking, the natural default form of perceiving and referring to data is ‘general’. So when I enter a gym for the first time I perceive the body builder guiding people, for the first time, as a trainer (general) and then as say Alex or Jim (specific). Across gyms the trainer (general) is a constant, whereas the Alexes and the Jims vary. So when I enter any new gym I expect my constants to be there as they are and the variables to be different. That is, when I enter any gym I expect there to be trainers but not necessarily Alex and Jim. When I enter a house I expect there to be air around (and not nitrous oxide or carbon monoxide) but not the same shape of the dining table as is in say my house. This is the basis of commonsense knowledge assumptions - why and how we make them or consider them as plausible.

COMMONSENSICAL CONTRADICTIONS

Whenever you assert any truth, you disassert some other “truths”. Empirical law : ‘A’ and “not A” don't coexist in commonsense. Actually they may. (Note : The ‘A’ is a predicate/property of some entity/ies.) What is NOT A? Every kind of a thing, or a thing for that matter, has a distinct identity because there is a set of properties in it which collectively aren't present in ANY OTHER thing. So in a sense, everything is unique! In fact, if it was not unique (in this sense) it wouldn't be a thing in the very first place. ‘Not A’ is meant in the above sense. John is a doctor. So John is not an architect. Architect is NOT a doctor. However, a person can be practicing both these professions. But as far as commonsense is concerned, a person who is a doctor is not an architect. John is in a saloon. So he is not in a hospital. Hospital is NOT a saloon. In reality, there might be a saloon inside a hospital. A and B are enemies. So it is only commonsense which tells me that A does not serve freshly baked cookies to B. because this gesture is expressing love and care which is NOT trying to harm each other which is a basic property of enmity. Although it is a possibility that their enmity is such that it allows leeway for such gestures. A commonsense contradiction is less exact/strict and more far-reaching in conclusions, than a logical/scientific/mathematical contradiction. In short, saying “the phone is to my right” implies logically only that it is not to my left, but commonsensically (along with the same) also that it is not to my northeast. If that was the case (northeast), it would be misleading the informant.

COMMONSENSE BELIEFS -

Most Aussies are fighters. John is an Aussie. So we believe that he is a fighter. John and Jack are friends. Friends know what they are doing in their lives (like studentship, job or business or whatever). So we believe that John and Jack know what the other is doing in his life. This works because knowing what the other does is BECAUSE OF the fact that they are friends. However, at the same time, that doesn't mean that all friends will know about each other. Note : this belief system works, it doesn't mean it's necessarily always true. But if I say this road is accident-prone (because there have been many accidents on this road), then it is wrong to be scared of the “road” per se because the cause might be a building on the road from whose terrace some miscreants who live in that building throw stones at cars. So the road is not per se the cause of the accidents. However, at the same time, the generic fact remains the same that you should be scared of that road till you don't figure this out since from the human mind’s perspective, correlations are the precursors to arriving at / detecting causes. If most parents love their children we say parents love their children. Commonsense fact/belief : A --- B most of the time. If a is a sample of a, then a---B. This is true only if ‘A’ness is the cause of A----B. That is, the link A----B should be true causally because of A. So if I say (most) Aussies are fighters. Then believing that a given Aussie is a fighter is right only if “being an Aussie” is the cause of the fighting spirit of the Aussies.

COMMONSENSE KNOWLEDGE MACHINERY IN UNDERSTANDING INFORMATION

John gave a ball to Jack. What all have I understood when I say I have understood this sentence? One thing I understand is - Before this (John giving the ball to Jack) happened, there were John and Jack existing/being. Then, John gave the ball to Jack. How do I say that John and Jack existed before? If you are doing something, then you are alive. If you are alive now, you were alive just before too. This gets processed by my commonsense. The fact that I process that John and Jack existed before is evidenced by the fact that one way in which I can explain the meaning of this sentence is - “There is a John. There is a Jack. And the former gave a ball to Jack” (like a story). The first two sentences are the evidence. Why did I create a story like this? One reason - Temporal sequence of events is always a good way to understand something. So basically by using that commonsense what I have done is a temporal dissection of the sentence. Another reason - it's always good to lay down the facts before stating the connections/relations amongst them. That helps comprehension. What was the mechanism of the commonsense processing? 1) I want a temporal sequence. That directly relates to ‘context’ - context is always “before in time”. Context explains the background scenario or the backdrop. John and Jack existing before is the backdrop / background scenario and thus the context for understanding this sentence. So we see that one direction for commonsense machinery to work in is to extract the context of the given information. Another thing I understand is - John gave the ball with his hands to Jack. How did this commonsense processing work? The presence of ‘ball’ in the part “gave a ball”. Balls are generally held in and handed over (given, in this case) via hands into the other person’s hands. Why did this process work? On being told that a ball was given to Jack by John, a followup logical story-completion question asking for more details, (which is a trait of understanding), which arose in the mind was - how was it given? Here is a basic link-list of - information and typical follow-up questions - which express the nature of our commonsense understanding process of anything given to us. Thing - what is it? Person - who is he? Process/action - how? Relation/connection - why? These get processed by default in the mind upon coming across information-elements. Answers to these questions are by commonsense if the information is commonplace, otherwise by asking the question to the source. So the 2 directions in which commonsense knowledge machinery works on given information, are towards context (for general comprehension requirements) and “picture-completion” (for specialized follow-up details)

COMMONSENSE IN CAUSALITY where human intent is involved -

If X is the reason and its said resultant responsive action is Y, you still cannot be sure if the commonsense function of action Y is the reason to address the reason X. So if X is the reason and Y is its said action in response, it is only commonsense assumption in the first place that the intention of the commonsense function of Y is to address the reason X. Illustration : Consider this - I am feeling hot. So I switched on the AC. Reason - I am feeling hot Responsive Action - I switched on the AC. The reason why the action was done could be that I like hearing the sound of AC while sweat is pouring down my body. So the reason the reason is the reason for the action may not be the commonsense function of the action. It is only a commonsense assumption that the cooling effect of the AC was desired to neutralize the hot feeling.

CONTINUITY IN SOLIDS -

Suppose I lift a TV from the top, commonsense says that the base of the TV would also move upwards. What is the explanation of such inferences of continuity? If a thing “looks” different from others, it is a different thing.If there is continuous sameness in any respect then it is the same thing till the point that that sameness is obeyed. In fact, this is how we define a ‘THING’ in the first place. For calling anything in the world a “thing”, there has to be sameness, in some respect, throughout that thing (i.e. throughout all the constituents of that thing). This is how we point to anything, or talk about anything as the subject. Coming to specifically the physical things, we do not perceive the physical world around us as, say, some one distinct object and an imaginary section of some of its surroundings as clubbed together with it to form one thing. The moment something is identified to be a ‘thing’ (as defined above), the effect of any action on any constituent of that thing is perceived to be on that whole thing. (When I stab a point on the surface of a table with a compass, it is perceived to be stabbing the ‘table surface’ or the ‘table’, and not just a point on the surface (where the tip of the compass actually hits the table surface). This explains - when we push, say, a TV remote it is commonsense that the remote moves as a whole, and not so that just the localized portion of application of force moves or gets displaced. In other words, this is talking about constraint relations in Mechanics. So when I lift up a TV from the top, it is commonsense that, say, the base of the TV would also move up.

FUNDAMENTAL COGNITIVE COMMONSENSE ALGORITHMS FOR GOALS -

1) I want X (I know of the state beforehand of being possible) -> What do I need for that? 2) I don't want X (Here you want the “opposite” of something. Here you don't QUITE have a perfect or an exact idea of what state you want. The goal is to just eliminate/undo the present state) -> What do I need to get rid of for that? Note : If at any conclusion-state the conclusion is “readily” available/possible in that state, ACT/EXECUTE IT. (This is the barest minimum commonsense). Then continue the above process. Example for Type 2 - My desk is unclean. Goal : I don't want my desk to be unclean. (Type 2). Autoresponse : What do I need to get rid of for that? Ans : Dirt. Conclusion : So I want to get rid of the dirt. This again becomes type 1. Autoresponse : What do I need for that? Ans : A cloth/rag. Conclusion : So I need a cloth. This is type 1. Autoresponse : What do I need for a cloth? Ans : I need to go to where it is kept. Conclusion : So I need to go to where it is kept. This is type 1. Autoresponse : What do I need to go to where it is kept? Ans : I need to walk. Conclusion : So I need to walk. If this is readily available (unless say, you are surrounded by a mess of furniture touching you on all sides preventing you from moving. Or say your legs are injured), ACT. Note that this function is in fact checked at every conclusion-state above. It fails at every earlier conclusion state (you cannot readily get rid of the dirt (i.e. it’s not going to disappear on its own), you cannot readily get a cloth (it's not going to fly and pop up into your hands) - if it does it (say, someone throws it at just that moment) ACT and continue the ‘process’, and you are not automatically going to land at the place where the cloth is kept). After you reach the place where the cloth is kept, the above process repeats. Also note that all the ‘Ans’ at every stage at retrieval of bare commonsense knowledge, which is behaving like a maximum-squeezed-version of the chain of commonsense thinking. Example for type 1 - I am somewhere nearby a building complex. Goal : I want to enter the building complex. Type 1. (I know that building complexes can be entered. This is the state known beforehand being possible). Autoresponse : What do I need for that? Ans - Gate/entrance. (This comes from the commonsense knowledge piece : A building complex has a gate to enter from.) Conclusion : Look for the gate/entrance.

A new language

Consider this funny sentence : John sandwichized. Suppose adding 'ized' to anything meant in our present-day language - hold it in your hand, put into your mouth, chew, swallow. Suppose there was no word like 'ate' (or 'eat') at all taught to you. And by the above, we understood what we TRULY UNDERSTAND by "John ate a sandwich." In a sentence, there is an indicator (word/chunk of the sentence/part of a word) for every concept. Learning language is learning which indicator stands for which concept in reality. For example, the suffix 'ized' to sandwich here makes us understand that a sandwich was eaten. The trouble with our language is that - there is a PARTIAL word “ate” for the literal process of eating, standing for - 'putting in mouth + chewing + swallowing'. Hence something is left to commonsense (which here is that ‘ate with “hand”’). If our language was like the way its suggested above, there would be no need for commonsense! This vaguely inspires something like - what if we have a language in which there are words, for all different collections of words which form the "commonsense package" associated with the present-day-language partial words, in various scenarios?

Commonsense questioning of the purpose

Consider these 2 separate sentences. John is preparing an omelet. There is an omelet there. After reading the first sentence, it occurs to you by commonsense that the omelet is being prepared for someone to eat (probably, John himself). In the second sentence it is not so easy, natural or “mentally-fluent” to occur that the omelet kept there is for someone to eat ultimately. Both the sentences talk about the existence of an omelet. But the difference is that the first sentence is talking about the preparation of one. So it's talking about the creation of an omelet. There is an action associated with an omelet in the first case. Whereas in the second case, there is just the mention of the mere existence of an omelet somewhere. ‘Actions having a purpose’ is more strike-friendly to the mind than mere ‘existence having purpose’. In other words, questioning ‘why?’ to actions is more natural and prompt than doing the same to mere existence. There is an allied minor point - the promptness of questioning a ‘why’ is more accentuated in the first case due to a ‘creation in process’ - an unfinished action - which creates the impact of “something happening” as against merely something being there (e.g. a building standing by the road).

A Commonsense Principle and its Mechanism

Suppose someone tells you - "Give me some money". Your mind says - "If I give him money from my wallet, the money in my wallet will decrease".

This has to strike you (as a piece of commonsense) if you think of giving money from your wallet.

Now here, 'give' and 'decrease' are the related key concepts in understanding this.

Commonsense principle behind this : 

Belonging / Owning are primal to attribute. In other words, attribute is possessed by (belongs to or is owned by) the "attributee". 

E.g. - This wallet is brown. This is an attribute of the wallet. So, the colour belongs to the wallet. Why is this statement significant? Because, if something happens to the colour, there will be an effect on the 'wallet's possessing of the colour', or in other words, on the wallet. So if I give money from my wallet, there will be an effect on the money possessed by the wallet / the wallet's possessing of the money (or in other words, 'on the wallet').

How does this above principle play a role in the mechanism of the working of this "commonsense" in the visual and linguistic machinery cases?

Going by the visual machinery : When we see or visualize money in a wallet to deal with this situation, we observe with our vision, 'the wallet and the money' but there isn't a conspicuous, explicit, vision-vocabulary for the 'insideness' (/possession/belonging/ownership). It is subtle, quick and "non-material in recognition". When we set our eyes on the scene, its a direct-impact-visual-data - that there is money in the wallet. The insideness is not as explicitly or blatantly recognized by the vision machinery, as are the wallet and the money notes, just by themselves. So the 'attributee possessing or owning the attribute' remains hidden teasingly this way, which if registered would enable the striking of the implication that giving money would decrease money IN THE WALLET.

Going by the linguistic machinery : Buts that's not the case with the analogous linguistic machinery. In language, there is an explicit mention of the insideness (of the money in the wallet) either by use of the words 'is inside the' or 'is in the' or whatever. So the 'insideness' is a piece of visual (subtle) commonsense/implicitness (the "attributee possessing the attribute), but linguistic explicitness. Hence, the existence of the striking step that 'money in wallet will decrease', AFTER understanding that 'you have to give the money in the wallet', while being in a real life situation as an actor/doer when someone just briefly says/hints to you "give me some money", wherein visual commonsense (via imagination) about the insideness plays. (Read further as distinct from before). Additional point to the above 2 machineries - However if you are completely in the "linguistic domain" i.e. say, someone says to you or you read somewhere - "Suppose you give money to someone from your wallet" - the realization that the money in the wallet will decrease seems like an "equivalent" statement, and not an implication. (The commonsense is "eased" in this case).

Commonsense - 'Actions'.

ACTIONS -

Consider this sentence - "Take one tablet everyday for one week".

Here, 'take' means 'consume', and not just take (in your hands).

If someone instructs you to do an action, you think of its probable intended purpose alongwith.

So incorporate this in a program - if (instruction for action): 

                                                      then think of its purpose.

So 'take' means take for the purpose of consuming.

--------------------

The step immediately following the action, may or may not be the purpose of the action.

Case 1 - 

When the immediately following step is also the purpose of the action, its commonsense, and the action and the purpose merge.

a) In the example above, "Take" -(actually means)-> "Take + eat"

b) When one fielder shouts at another - Throw the ball.

The purpose of throwing the ball is to hit the stumps, which is also the immediately following step in the process. So, there is merger : "throw" -(actually means)-> "throw + hit the stumps".

Case 2 - 

Consider someone telling you - Wash your hands (after your meal is over). 

When someone says this to you, you realize their intended purpose - that is - to clean the hands, (which is for them being usable for other purposes later). However, the 'immediately following step' in this case is 'wiping them with a napkin', which is NOT the purpose of the action. 

General human algorithm for learning Commonsense

 General human algorithm for learning Commonsense –

Whenever we notice any data, we notice properties of that data upon some reflection. For example, suppose a kid visits your house and sees a big, brown cupboard with books inside it. Say, the “data” he notices in it is – ‘there are books kept inside a cupboard’. (Suppose the cupboard is transparent).

Now, there are an enormous number of properties to this “data”. That, the books are kept on shelves in the cupboard. That, the books are vertical in the cupboard. That, they are touching each other face to face in the cupboard. That some books in the cupboard are red, some blue, some brown. That the books are on 4 layers of shelves of the cupboard. That, the books are inside a door of the cupboard with spherical knobs. Etc.

Notice that these are all properties of the “data” – ‘there are books kept inside a cupboard’.

Now, the kid leaves your house. He goes on with his life. He goes to school, to his tennis coaching, to the playground in his building, eats, sleeps etc.

 

Consider some of the  above properties of the “data” –

1.       books are on shelves in the cupboard,

2.       books are vertical in the cupboard,

3.       books are touching other books in the cupboard,

4.       books are on 4 shelves in the cupboard

Each of these properties get stored in the mind in a “Dual Format” –

Format 1) The whole set of properties associated with the “data”, and

Format 2) Each property, OUT-OF-CONTEXT from the “data”, whereby each becomes one different, general instance of a property of the key words (books, cupboard) in the “data”. Each becomes a data-property piece, wherein this new data now here is the keyword in the original “data”.

Let me explain. Lets see (2) in detail. For example, the 4^th property in the list above – books are on 4 shelves in the cupboard – gets out of context from the “data” and gets stored as a separate instance of “a cupboard having a property that it has 4 shelves”. So now there is an isolated, out of context data-property piece stored in the mind - ‘a cupboard having 4 shelves’.

So now the mind has a list of properties of the “data”, and also, isolated, out of context data-property pieces like ‘a cupboard having 4 shelves’.

 

Lets focus our attention back to (1) – the list/set of properties of the original “data”. When the kid sees another instance (and further, more instances) of the same “data” – ‘books kept inside a cupboard’, firstly, other lists of properties get enlisted in those instances, each for an instance. From across these lists of properties of the various instances of the same “data”, the corresponding properties ((i.e. orientation of the books, the touchability of the books, there being shelves etc.) gather together in the mind (owing to the sheer correspondence) and if the “values” of the properties (like say, the books being ‘VERTICAL’) get repeated across a lot of these instances, a piece of commonsense expectation about the world – that books are kept vertical in cupboards – gets formed in the mind.

Lets extend this to (2). Sometimes the kid might see something like just books on a table, or say in a bag. Here the same above process repeats. Remember, he has an isolated, out-of-context piece like ‘books being vertical’ in his mind. So ‘Books’ (the keyword in the “data”) becomes the new data with a property-value of its being ‘VERTICALNESS’. This will be compared similarly as in the process above, with the values of the orientation of the books seen now (table, bag) and checked for repeated-ness and consequently for the formation of a commonsense expectation about the world. (In this particular case, no particular commonsense will be learned since he sees books on a table being horizontal and vertical in bags. May be something like - books are kept vertically OR horizontally wherever they are.) 

COMMONSENSE "INFRASTRUCTURE" IS IN-BORN

COMMONSENSE "INFRASTRUCTURE" IS IN-BORN -

The essence of what anything means lies in what it means to us, which in turn lies in our 'EXPERIENCE' with it. Now, firstly, you cannot even talk about something which you haven't "had an experience of" in some way. Even if you conceive of an arbitrary, imaginary word, nothing like which exists in real, you still have experienced the phonetics of it.

What is the essence of 'steps' (of a staircase)? You would immediately narrow down and say - they take us up (or down), bit by bit. Now, there are so many aspects to steps - 1) the planes are parallel 2) they are made of marble or stone or whatever 3) they keep shifting to the right (seen across) 4) each is made of perpendicular dimensions etc. But these things are not quite the "essence" of steps. The essence is as is said above. How does one get to it? When one actually uses steps he gets the feeling - the experience - of being elevated or descended. He also moves ahead, but that experience is had even while normal flat walking. So the core of the essence of the meaning of steps is the bit by bit elevation or descendence, which occurs to us when we experience them.

Moving on further, can we experience everything? Jupiter and Saturn? Yes, as kids, we see pictures of them in the encyclopedia. Now, extending the above point in a sense, the bulk of every person's experience with a picture of Saturn is going to be the same. That there is a sphere and that there are circular rings around it. Some specifics may differ, but there will be a common core to all kids. This is where I am hinting at and going towards commonsense. Nobody is going to perceive Saturn as - "there is an arbitrarily shaped patch on the ring-plane, then moving above and to the left there is nothing (air), then there is a solid curved patch, then to its left there is a similar colour and material solid patch etc. So there is a commonality in the basic way in which all of us perceive things around us. There is some common perceptual machinery with which we absorb the data around us, to a certain minimal extent. This is a function clearly of our embodiment - combination of the locations and arrangement of our heads and other organs. This basic machinery contributes to WHAT and HOW we perceive the reality around us. Hence this cannot be separated from what we call our 'commonsense'. Yes, the fact that food is served in plates is not inborn, but rather learned and acquired, but the basal machinery to acquire that, which is inseparable from the common SENSE itself, is inborn.

This shows up in our experience with things around us, what they mean to us, and thus in what the essence of their meaning, and casually speaking, just their meaning, is. The observed is a function of the observer. Human commonsense is "human".