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From: jqb@netcom.com (Jim Balter)
Subject: Re: Open Letter to Professor Penrose
Message-ID: <jqbDttIDL.995@netcom.com>
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References: <30f24523.23436167@news.gnn.com> <4qe5rr$8nn@decaxp.HARVARD.EDU> <4qmnkk$a8q@luna.mv.us.adobe.com> <4qtims$mfa@tines.hsc.fr>
Date: Sun, 30 Jun 1996 14:46:33 GMT
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Xref: glinda.oz.cs.cmu.edu sci.physics:197564 sci.logic:18975 comp.ai:39647 comp.ai.philosophy:43450 sci.philosophy.meta:30304

In article <4qtims$mfa@tines.hsc.fr>, Vincent Archer <archer@hsc.fr> wrote:
>William Tyler (wtyler@adobe.com) wrote:
>> set of integers, for example. IMHO, Penrose and others are simply
>> emotionally unwilling to acknowledge that they themselves may be
>> finite, and therefore construct elaborate and obfuscatory arguments to
>> the contrary.
>
>Brains, as a static system, are intrinsically finite. However, brains,
>"as an evolving system" are not so finite, because brain structure will
>evolve over time. Currently, it's mostly decay, except during your youth,
>but, if one were to postulate immortality (and hence an infinite amount of
>time, and drugs/treatments that would sustain a brain), your brain could
>evolve into configurations that are totally impossible in it's current
>hardware.
>
>Heck, given immortality, you would need to evolve, or you would end up
>repeating yourself over the million of years...
>
>Plus, do not forget that a brain doesn't exist in vacuum. Given an infinite
>universe outside, its inputs will vary. A brain can have a finite number of
>responses to a given stimulus, but when presented an infinite number of
>different stimuli?

As always, the same arguments apply to other kinds of computers than brains.

-- 
<J Q B>

