tanner@BU-CS.BU.EDU (06/10/88)
) THe brain is undoubetedly a complex computer, but the ) mind is a non-tangible thing. Just as this VAX 8600 I am using now ) is a complex (supercomputers and the like aside) computer, but the ) programs I am using to send this message have absolutely no physical ) substance. The vax is indeed complex (though perhaps less so than the brain), but it is a deterministic device. All of the operations in the vax are performed by programs which are represented physically by electrical and magnetic states (flux changes on disk drive or voltages in memory cells). In fact, every program which is run on your computer has a physical substance which is (in principle) measurable by inserting voltage probes at the proper junctions. In case of trouble, it may be possible to arrange for a record of the computer state (possibly with an accompanying message "bus error, core dumped"). The same may not be true of the mind: I can not be sure that I can measure your brain and determine (eg) what kind if pizza you are imagining. Dr. T. Andrews, Systems CompuData, Inc. DeLand
jimmyz%oak.dnet@VLSI2.EE.UFL.EDU (Anubis The Psychic Chaos Metal Riffer Warrior) (06/10/88)
Well Dr. Andrews, you may be right about programs physically existing, if you want to say electrical charges and magnetic flux count as physical. But the human mind is still similar in the aspect that it is a complex set of chemo-electrical impulses, and some chemical reactions. In either case, mind or program, there is no physical whole that we can directly view or handle, is there? Measure, maybe... but that is a different thing all together. (By the way, I has pizza for dinner tonight... How did you know?!)
tanner@BU-CS.BU.EDU (06/11/88)
) Well Dr. Andrews, you may be right about programs physically existing, ) if you want to say electrical charges and magnetic flux count as ) physical. But the human mind is still similar in the aspect that it ) is a complex set of chemo-electrical impulses, ... Not a bit of it. The \fBbrain\fP is such a complex set of electro- chemical impluses and reactions. The \fBmind\fP, on the other hand, is something which we have to date not fully defined. Yes, I count electrical charges and magnetic flux as physical. I can measure them. There is a direct mapping between the "thoughts" of your vax (its program) and those charges and flux changes. [ Remember the two clocks from philosophy 101? One had hands, but no bell. The other had a bell, but no hands. If both are set accurately, when the large hand on the one points up, the other makes noise. ] Consider now your vax::program relationship \(em a single clock, with wires to a bell. At the proper time, the bell goes off because the clock pushes in a switch. On the other hand, the brain::mind (thought) relationship may more closely resemble the two clocks of PHL101. At any rate, I will grant you that (with our current state of knowledge) we have no physical whole which we can describe and (in principle) view and measure. The lack of full physical understanding of the mind is what separates it from the full understanding we have of the program. People do model computers, existing and otherwise. One of the important uses of computers is, after all, designing new computers. If the AI types wish to model a brain, I will grant the theoretical possibility. It may be slow and expensive, but it should be possible in principle. It is also possible to model a program on a computer; an emulator for another processor is the second most common case. I do not grant that it is yet possible to model thought, and I don't think that either of us knows for certain that it will ever be possible. (stability problem: I measure things by watching them on an infinitely fast scope. Don't you wish you had a zillion-GHz memory scope? Me too) Dr. T. Andrews, Systems CompuData, Inc. DeLand
bzs@BU-CS.BU.EDU (Barry Shein) (06/11/88)
>The same may not be true of the mind: I can not be sure that I can >measure your brain and determine (eg) what kind if pizza you are >imagining. > > Dr. T. Andrews, Systems Recently I heard a rumor of a project where a computer had been hooked to an EEG ("brain waves".) Apparently, after some training (think of the word "red" and tell it you are now thinking of the word "red", it records the EEG patterns, etc), the machine would guess with some accuracy that you were currently thinking of a particular word out of the learned set. I have no idea if this story was total fiction or not, it was word of mouth. -Barry Shein, Boston University
lethin@UUNET.UU.NET (Richard Lethin) (06/12/88)
) THe brain is undoubetedly a complex computer, but the
) mind is a non-tangible thing. Just as this VAX 8600 I am using now
) is a complex (supercomputers and the like aside) computer, but the
) programs I am using to send this message have absolutely no physical
) substance.
The vax is indeed complex (though perhaps less so than the brain), but
it is a deterministic device. All of the operations in the vax are
performed by programs which are represented physically by electrical
and magnetic states (flux changes on disk drive or voltages in memory
cells).
In fact, every program which is run on your computer has a physical
substance which is (in principle) measurable by inserting voltage
probes at the proper junctions. In case of trouble, it may be possible
to arrange for a record of the computer state (possibly with an
accompanying message "bus error, core dumped").
The same may not be true of the mind: I can not be sure that I can
measure your brain and determine (eg) what kind if pizza you are
imagining.
Dr. T. Andrews, Systems
CompuData, Inc. DeLand
How does the findamental metastability problem (that all synchronous digital
circuits are subject to, because they live in an asynchronous world) affect
your argument?
-------urban@spp2.UUCP (Michael Urban) (06/14/88)
In article <8806111528.AA14519@bu-cs.bu.edu> bzs@BU-CS.BU.EDU (Barry Shein) writes: >Recently I heard a rumor of a project where a computer had been hooked >to an EEG ("brain waves".) Apparently, after some training (think of >the word "red" and tell it you are now thinking of the word "red", it >records the EEG patterns, etc), the machine would guess with some >accuracy that you were currently thinking of a particular word out >of the learned set. > >I have no idea if this story was total fiction or not, it was word of >mouth. > There was a project at UCLA in the mid '70s called the Brain Computer Interface Lab. They had subjects sit in an isolation box with electrodes on their heads watching a screen with a "mouse" in a maze. The computer did some kind of rapid pattern recognition on the EEG and with some training the subjects were able to cause the mouse to go Left or Right. Disclaimer: I was not involved in this project; their lab was next to the ARPANET facility. I may remember this entirely wrong. I certainly cannot tell you what variety of machine they were using to process EEGs. They were using an Imlac PDS-1 as the display device (and their lab was thus a nice place to go to play Spacewar). You should believe nothing in the previous paragraph without an implicit "as I remember it" inserted. -- Mike Urban ...!trwrb!trwspp!spp2!urban "You're in a maze of twisty UUCP connections, all alike"
tws@beach.cis.ufl.edu (Thomas Sarver) (06/22/88)
In article <8806120535.AA26709@bu-cs.bu.edu> harvard!codas!ki4pv!tanner@BU-CS.BU.EDU writes: >[ Remember the two clocks from philosophy 101? One had hands, but > no bell. The other had a bell, but no hands. If both are set > accurately, when the large hand on the one points up, the other makes > noise. ] > >Consider now your vax::program relationship \(em a single clock, with >wires to a bell. At the proper time, the bell goes off because the >clock pushes in a switch. > >On the other hand, the brain::mind (thought) relationship may more >closely resemble the two clocks of PHL101. At any rate, I will grant > Dr. T. Andrews, Systems > CompuData, Inc. DeLand Come, Come, folks. Those in PHL101 also remember that Kant came along and blasted the Mind/Body Dualism. I like the poster who talked about the mind continually redefining itself as a result of its experiences. This maps directly onto Kant's treatise that the mind interacts with the experience and EVERYTHING IS RELATIVE. More specifically, the minds uses its past experience to map what is already known onto the new experience. That which has never been experienced before will probably not have an effect. Those things most familiar will only reinforce what is already known as "fact." While an experience somewhere in between will lead to new knowledge and more intro- spection. (Some of Kant's work was used in Learning Theory.) If we are going to talk philosophy, at least use one up to date enough to map onto the subject. +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ But hey, its the best country in the world! Thomas W. Sarver "The complexity of a system is proportional to the factorial of its atoms. One can only hope to minimize the complexity of the micro-system in which one finds oneself." -TWS Addendum: "... or migrate to a less complex micro-system."