From newshub.ccs.yorku.ca!ists!helios.physics.utoronto.ca!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!think.com!ames!haven.umd.edu!mimsy!harwood Thu Dec 26 23:57:06 EST 1991
Article 2271 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: harwood@umiacs.umd.edu (David Harwood)
Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy
Subject: In the news (re: Searle's response to silicon brain?)
Message-ID: <45183@mimsy.umd.edu>
Date: 19 Dec 91 12:47:24 GMT
References: <356@idtg.UUCP> <40858@dime.cs.umass.edu> <1991Dec19.072826.28385kmc@netcom.COM>
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In today's news, Dec.19, 1991:

	Today's front page of the Washington Post
announces "Silicon Chip Mimics Human Brain Cell,"
developed by M. Mahowald, student of Carver Mead at
CalTech, and R. Douglas at Oxford U. They are to report
in _Nature_ today.
	The "neurochip" is an analog device, using very
little power compared to conventional designs, and apparently
simulates some internal electrical properties of neurons,
and adaptively spikes output.
	The article concludes with an assessment by Marvin
Minsky, "I don't think this tells us anything we didn't
already know," and, "To me it's such a long jump to the
human brain that this isn't interesting. For one thing,
there are several hundred kinds of neurons. Which one's
this supposed to be?"

(my summary)




