X-Message-Number: 14997 Date: Thu, 23 Nov 2000 06:22:17 -0500 From: Thomas Donaldson <> Subject: more on computers and brains Hi everyone! Among the problems with identifying brains with Turing computers one is very simple: the original idea of a Turing computer is of a computer which does no more than calculate. It does not hunt animals or raise and use a crop of wheat. At a minimum this means that any attempt to map human brains into computers would have to assume that these computers also had many peripherals ... most of our processing simply could not happen if we were brains without all the connections we have. Moreover, that special feature of brains also means that we cannot be thought about only as a COMPUTING machine. We also take input and produce output, which has a special character in that all our thinking depends on the simple, NONlinguistic versions of input. Yes, because we are human beings rather than chickens, we do have elaborate systems for producing and understanding complex linguistic output (and input). The systems are absent from current computers, and have turned out to be difficult to produce at the level at which we human beings use them. Most important, our linguistic systems ARE NOT THE BASIC SYSTEMS WITH WHICH WE DO OUR BASIC PROCESSING. It's precisely because of this fact that we can do curious things with language, such as decide on the existence of black swans (despite all previous definitions of swans). So far the only person on Cryonet who has come close to answering my question about whether or not humans may be considered Turing machines is Mike Perry. His references to computer material, however, need much more in that they do not really discuss candidates for Turing machines like human beings. It seems to simply be assumed that thinking requires a Turing machine. Maybe so, maybe not, but an explicit demonstration WHICH uses the features of brains which I have explained in previous messages would prove useful, one way or another. Does all thinking map easily into a Turing machine? Does it map at all? On the simplest level, the fact that we are PARALLEL machines for which TIME is important should tell us that in at least one way we differ from the original Turing machines. And are there other levels? Best wishes and long long life to all, Thomas Donaldson Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=14997