[ExI] digital simulations, descriptions and copies

[Gordon Swobe]

--- On Tue, 1/19/10, Stathis Papaioannou <stathisp at gmail.com> wrote:

> The "matter thinks" theory of mind can't explain where how
> people understand words either. 

I don't consider myself in possession of any "theory". I just observe that the brain as it exists in nature does not seem to work like a digital computer. 

We notice a phenomenon and we try to put together hypotheses to explain it. If a given hypothesis fails, we toss it out and keep trying. 

In this case we notice the phenomenon of consciousness/semantics -- the conscious understanding of words.

Hoping to explain the conscious understanding of words and other puzzles, some clever techno-geeks with just enough knowledge of philosophy to be dangerous put together the so-called "computationalist theory of mind". It seemed like a great idea at the time. 

The running of mental programs might explain the method by which can think but it fails to explain how we *know* about our own thoughts. The brain must then do something else besides run programs. So I toss that hypothesis out as incomplete or wrong and keep trying.

Philosophically, to resolve the consciousness/semantics problem the computationalist theory must commit the homunculus fallacy. If the brain equals a digital computer and if the mind equals a program running on that computer then there must exist a homunculus to operate and observe that computer. So the theory fails.

-gts