[ExI] The digital nature of brains

[Gordon Swobe]

--- On Fri, 2/5/10, Stathis Papaioannou <stathisp at gmail.com> wrote:

>> I take it that on your view a picture dictionary
>> understands the nouns for which it has pictures, since it
>> "pairs" its word-symbols with sense-data, grounding the
>> symbols in the same way that a computer + webcam can pair
>> and ground symbols.
> 
>> How about a lunch menu? Does it understand sandwiches?
> :-)
> 
> No, they're not intelligent. Your argument here is
> equivalent to me pointing to an inert lump of matter in order to 
> demonstrate that matter is incapable of thinking.

True or false, Stathis: 

When program running on a digital computer associates a sense-datum (say, an image of object taken with its web-cam) with the appropriate word-symbol, the system running that program has now by virtue of that association grounded the word-symbol and now has understanding of the meaning of that word-symbol.

-gts