X-Message-Number: 25892
Date: Sun, 27 Mar 2005 09:21:55 -0500
From: Thomas Donaldson <>
Subject: To Mark Plus and Yvan Bozzonetti

To Mark Plus:

Your constant harping on scarcity has become a little boring. We may have
scarcity of oil for a few months while existing systems for making 
oil from shale sands and even coal can be set up and run. Rationing 
for a few months is clearly rational if there really ever is a sharp
falloff in the availability of oil. Yet not everyone fails to think 
ahead, and any people who can provide a solution will make lots of 
money --- so that this sharp falloff that you postulate may never
happen at all. I regret repeating myself, but you can't just look at
oil wells if you want to claim there will be a shortage. You have to
look at lots of other sources which would come on line if oil wells
went away.

To Yvan Bozzonetti:

A computer which runs programs imitating brains might do so very
well, but it's not the same as an actual brain. Among other problems,
it will have problems and restrictions that brains don't have, as
a practical issue --- not to mention the problem of whether a 
close model of a brain implemented in a large parallel computer
can really think, feel, and decide anything.

And in any case, just how small will your electrical neuron be
compared to a real one? A system designed to implement a program,
and running that program, looks to me unlikely to have the 
compactness of a system which is physically designed to do what
the program does. (A computer model of a pendulum or a fire
hydrant is far from the best way to make either machine).

You can pile as much math as you wish on this problem, but I don't
think that approach will work at all. (And I'm a mathematician
by training incidentally). I would start by first creating a
form of life not based on biotechnology, and see how far I
can take such a life form.

And I will repeat the last sentence in my last message to you.

               Best wishes and long long life for all,

                   Thomas Donaldson

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