[ExI] The digital nature of brains (was: digital simulations)

[Gordon Swobe]

--- On Fri, 1/22/10, Eric Messick <eric at m056832107.syzygy.com> wrote:

> Most thermostats installed today are digital simulations of
> analog thermostats.  They manage to get the job done anyway.

Modern thermostats contain digital circuitry but they do not equal digital simulations of analog thermostats. 

To see this, imagine that you have an instrument for scanning objects to create digital simulations. You scan an analog thermostat and observe the resulting simulation on your computer. You will not see a real digital thermostat appear on your computer screen. Instead you will see a digital simulation of a non-digital object. That simulation will not have the properties of the original; it will not have the capacity to regulate temperature in your room. 

At best that simulated analog thermostat can regulate simulated temperature in a simulated room that you also create on your computer, and then only as a digital simulation of an analog thermostat, not as a digital simulation of a digital thermostat.

-gts