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Article 2399 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: weemba@libra.wistar.upenn.edu (Matthew P Wiener)
Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy
Subject: Ignore QM and be happy
Message-ID: <61056@netnews.upenn.edu>
Date: 25 Dec 91 01:49:52 GMT
References: <1991Dec24.054745.16805@bronze.ucs.indiana.edu>
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Reply-To: weemba@libra.wistar.upenn.edu (Matthew P Wiener)
Organization: The Wistar Institute of Anatomy and Biology
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In-reply-to: chalmers@bronze.ucs.indiana.edu (David Chalmers)

In article <1991Dec24.054745.16805@bronze.ucs.indiana.edu>, chalmers@bronze (David Chalmers) writes:
>This is a complex matter, but basically I don't see any real problem
>with the idea that insofar as the non-neural biological tissue plays a
>causal role, we can simulate it.

Why don't you?  You've surveyed all possible chemical reactions and
identified them as being computable?

What happens when the mind contemplates an infinite set?  Is there a
QM observable that corresponds to it?  With eigenvalues that represent
typical members?  And which can be manipulated according to certain
otherwise recursive rules?

>				   Presumably we'll divide it up into
>little chunks and simulate those one at a time, keeping track of
>those properties that are relevant to causation: monitoring inputs
>to the region (e.g. chemical changes at the boundary), updating
>our simulation of the internal state accordingly, and producing
>via some kind of transducer the appropriate outputs (again including
>chemical changes).

Or presumably we'll run up into a brick wall where simulation just
completely fails.

You can presume what you want, but as a style of argument, it carries
no weight.

>		     The sensitivity of neurons to the surrounding
>tissue can be simulated similarly.

Or not.

>In article <41010@dime.cs.umass.edu> orourke@sophia.smith.edu (Joseph O'Rourke) writes:
>>	One could imagine tiny chemical reservoirs with computer-
>>controlled release mechanisms (not unlike fuel injection control
>>in automobiles), which would enable a silicon neuron to release
>>an appropriate amount of e.g. acetlycholine at just the right times.
>>Such chemical release would be needed only at the interface between
>>silicon and biological tissue; the silicon/silicon interface could
>>be simulated as Chalmers suggests.

One _cannot_ imagine this as having to do with our own brains, except
for the sake of nonsensical conclusions.  For at the picolevel, there
is never such a notion as releasing neurotransmitter "at just the right
times".  The work of Katz in the 50s on the probabilistic release of
acetylcholine vesicles is textbook knowledge by now; I cited Eccles on
how this accords with a quantum mechanical description.

Seriously--just how would a computer control quantum tunnelling?  We are
not talking about nanotechnology, we are talking about picotechnology.

>That's another way we could do it, but it would have less force
>against Searle, as we'd still be relying on specific physiochemical
>properties in an essential way.

And the question is still unanswered: do *we* rely on some such specific
physiochemical properties in an essential way?
-- 
-Matthew P Wiener (weemba@libra.wistar.upenn.edu)


