From newshub.ccs.yorku.ca!ists!helios.physics.utoronto.ca!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!menudo.uh.edu!mtecv2!pl160988 Mon May 25 14:04:49 EDT 1992
Article 5588 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: pl160988@mtecv2.mty.itesm.mx (Ivan Ordonez-Reinoso)
Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy
Subject: Re: syntax and semantics
Message-ID: <5755@mtecv2.mty.itesm.mx>
Date: 12 May 92 18:18:33 GMT
References: <1992Apr9.174840.3407@organpipe.uug.arizona.edu> <5674@mtecv2.mty.itesm.mx> <2@tdatirv.UUCP>
Organization: I.T.E.S.M. Campus Monterrey
Lines: 31

In article <2@tdatirv.UUCP> sarima@tdatirv.UUCP (Stanley Friesen) writes:
>
>|Just one thing: How do you know? I mean, if you disect a living brain,
>|you won't find any meaning or reference either.
>
>But that was the whole point!  At that level semantics cannot be found.
What I meant is that meaning and reference are abstract concepts that
cannot be found by mere dissection. Thus you can't say "This is just a
neuron; it has no meaning attached to its function", for the same reason
you can't say that about the brain.
>
>|We can't equate neurons
>|to microprocessors, since we don't know yet how a neuron works.
>
>WRONG me bucko!   We *do* know, in large part, how a neuron works.
>We may not know the smallest details, but then that is true for every
>branch of science - we do not know all there is to know about particle
>physics either.

Maybe those small details contain critical elements to achieve a full
understanding of neurons. Like the relevance of QM to their function.
Somebody (I don't remember who) said that maybe Schrodinger's equation
describes ethics in a way we can't see yet. In the same way, maybe the
function of the neuron contains meaning, reference, and semantics. We
just don't see it, because we don't really understand them.

Ivan Ordonez-Reinoso
Centro de Inteligencia Artificial
ITESM, Campus Monterrey, Mexico
pl160988@mtecv2.mty.itesm.mx



