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Article 5024 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: bill@NSMA.AriZonA.EdU (Bill Skaggs)
Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy
Subject: Re: syntax and semantics
Message-ID: <1992Apr9.174840.3407@organpipe.uug.arizona.edu>
Date: 9 Apr 92 17:48:40 GMT
References: <1992Apr03.164328.8107@spss.com> <1992Apr4.061244.767@mp.cs.niu.edu> <92098.170625JPE1@psuvm.psu.edu> <1992Apr8.215800.18021@mp.cs.niu.edu> <92099.194744JPE1@psuvm.psu.edu>
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Reply-To: bill@NSMA.AriZonA.EdU (Bill Skaggs)
Organization: Center for Neural Systems, Memory, and Aging
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In article <92099.194744JPE1@psuvm.psu.edu> 
JPE1@psuvm.psu.edu writes:
>     The point is not that what computers do is _necessarily_ meaningless, just
>that, at the machine level, there is no inherent meaning (or reference).  It
>is we who come along and project reference upon the formal manipulations that
>the computer has carried out. 

> John Emmer

  I don't agree with this analysis (if I understand it).  In a brain,
at the neuron level, there is also no inherent meaning or reference.
But this does not mean that it is up to us to decide whether or not
to "project" meaning and reference.  Meaning is an aspect of function,
and function is conferred by design.  Computers are designed by
people, and brains are designed by natural selection.  The roles
that symbols play are the purposes they are designed to serve, and
observers have nothing to do with it.

	-- Bill


