Abstract
Moderate eliminative connectionism (MEC) is outlined and defended against criticisms of Paul Smolensky's proper treatment of connectionism (PTC) position. It is argued that, contrary to certain appearances, PTC is committed to the claims of MEC that symbolic theories are false and that the entities they posit do not exist. Disagreement between PTC and MEC centres upon MECS further claim that symbolic theories will be gradually eliminated from cognitive science in favour of non-symbolic higher-level theories. The arguments derived from PTCS 'principle of approximate explanation' against this further claim are shown not to bestow any special advantage on PTC.