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From: jqb@netcom.com (Jim Balter)
Subject: Re: Penrose and Searle (was Re: Roger Penrose's fixed ideas)
Message-ID: <jqbD02yo1.35B@netcom.com>
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References: <JMC.94Nov22011226@white.wisdom.weizmann.ac.il> <CzuCBz.80z@cwi.nl> <Czzp8B.C2t@cogsci.ed.ac.uk> <D00uxJ.8o2@cwi.nl>
Date: Wed, 30 Nov 1994 12:28:49 GMT
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Xref: glinda.oz.cs.cmu.edu sci.skeptic:96663 comp.ai.philosophy:22891 sci.philosophy.meta:15145

In article <D00uxJ.8o2@cwi.nl>, Olaf Weber <olaf@cwi.nl> wrote:
>The mistake made by "neural chauvinists" is that they say "if it is
>too different from us, it cannot have mental states," with "too
>different" defined as "not using neurons like ours".  While Searle is
>more sophisticated than that, he certainly appeals to those sentiments
>(ibid, Chapter 9 section IV, page 207):
>
>	But now if we are trying to take seriously the idea that the
>	brain is a digital computer, we get the uncomfortable result
>	that we could make a system that does just what the brain does
>	out of pretty much anything.  [Including] cats and  mice and
>	cheese or levers or water pipes or pigeons ...

What truly disturbs me is that anyone who can make this sort of argument
is considered seriously at all.  "Uncomfortable result", indeed.  I wonder if
anyone would care to formalize that notion.

Apparently Searle is completely unfamiliar with engineering constraints.  We
don't build computers out of cheese for good reasons, but I suppose Searle
sees no reason not to run nuclear power plants or track space missions with
pigeon computers.  I have seen simple computers built from tinker toys, and
presumably parts could be replaced by suitably constrained cat, mice, Rube
Goldberg cheeseball mechanisms, and the like.  Ignoring the size and the
response time.  After all, it's just a thought experiment, isn't it?
-- 
<J Q B>
