What is and isn't considered "symbol manipulation"?

[scratch123]

The words "symbol" and "manipulation" are so general that "symbol manipulation" could mean just about anything. The only way you could make it more general is to call it "object manipulation" or something. I always get annoyed when I see this in reference to computers because I suspect the author doesn't really understand what it means and is just trying to over complicate things.

[letterX]

Could you... provide a little more context? I'm trying to think of where the phrase 'symbol manipulation' comes up in Computer Science, and my top hit is that it is basically the metaphor that Turing Machines are supposed to capture. I.e., that you have an infinite tape of symbols, and an abstract 'mathematician' with a finite control who can look at symbols on the tape, change them, and move to a new position, etc. It's a bit vague, as far as metaphors go, but the whole point of TMs is to formalize what that's supposed to mean. So once you pass to the formal system, everything's clear again.

Unless that isn't what you're asking about...

[troyp]

I'd also ask for more context.
It's a pretty broad term. It refers to manipulating a fixed collection of symbols according to a set of definite rules. So any kind of formal system. Any computational process can be seen as symbol manipulation, and many people believe it's necessary and sufficient for general intelligence.
Basically, the sense of the term is that symbols are being manipulated "mechanically", without any deeper, "intuitive" knowledge of their meaning.

[Sagekilla]

The words "symbol" and "manipulation" are so general that "symbol manipulation" could mean just about anything. The only way you could make it more general is to call it "object manipulation" or something. I always get annoyed when I see this in reference to computers because I suspect the author doesn't really understand what it means and is just trying to over complicate things.

You know Math is symbol manipulation, right? We can do all kinds of fancy transforms and so forth, but it's all just "manipulating the symbols."