I was writing a kinda long reply but maybe I should first clarify: what do you mean by “model”? Can you give examples of ways that I could learn something (or otherwise change my synapses within a lifetime) that you wouldn’t characterize as “changes to my mental model”? For example, which of the following would be “changes to my mental model”?
I learn that Brussels is the capital of Belgium
I learn that it’s cold outside right now
I taste a new brand of soup and find that I really like it
I learn to ride a bicycle, including
maintaining balance via fast hard-to-describe responses where I shift my body in certain ways in response to different sensations and perceptions
being able to predict how the bicycle and me would move if I swung my arm around
I didn’t sleep well so now I’m grumpy
FWIW my inclination is to say that 1-4 are all “changes to my mental model”. And 5 involves both changes to my mental model (knowing that I’m grumpy), and changes to the inputs to my mental model (I feel different “feelings” than I otherwise would—I think of those as inputs going into the model, just like visual inputs go into the model). Is there anything wrong / missing / suboptimal about that definition?
Vertigo, lust, pain reactions, some fear responses, and so on, don’t involve a model. Some versions of “learning that it’s cold outside” don’t involve a model, just looking out and shivering; the model aspect comes in when you start reasoning about what to do about it. People often drive to work without consciously modelling anything on the way.
Think model-based learning versus Q-learning. Anything that’s more Q-learning is not model based.
I was writing a kinda long reply but maybe I should first clarify: what do you mean by “model”? Can you give examples of ways that I could learn something (or otherwise change my synapses within a lifetime) that you wouldn’t characterize as “changes to my mental model”? For example, which of the following would be “changes to my mental model”?
I learn that Brussels is the capital of Belgium
I learn that it’s cold outside right now
I taste a new brand of soup and find that I really like it
I learn to ride a bicycle, including
maintaining balance via fast hard-to-describe responses where I shift my body in certain ways in response to different sensations and perceptions
being able to predict how the bicycle and me would move if I swung my arm around
I didn’t sleep well so now I’m grumpy
FWIW my inclination is to say that 1-4 are all “changes to my mental model”. And 5 involves both changes to my mental model (knowing that I’m grumpy), and changes to the inputs to my mental model (I feel different “feelings” than I otherwise would—I think of those as inputs going into the model, just like visual inputs go into the model). Is there anything wrong / missing / suboptimal about that definition?
Vertigo, lust, pain reactions, some fear responses, and so on, don’t involve a model. Some versions of “learning that it’s cold outside” don’t involve a model, just looking out and shivering; the model aspect comes in when you start reasoning about what to do about it. People often drive to work without consciously modelling anything on the way.
Think model-based learning versus Q-learning. Anything that’s more Q-learning is not model based.