[ExI] aeon article - you have no memory

[John Clark]

On Fri, May 20, 2016 at 1:05 PM, William Flynn Wallace <foozler83 at gmail.com>
wrote:

https://aeon.co/essays/your-brain-does-not-process-information-and-it-is-not-a-computer?utm_source=Aeon+Newsletter&utm_campaign=0223b88963-Weekly_Newsletter_20_May_20165_20_2016&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_411a82e59d-0223b88963-68993993
>
> ​> ​
> Not surprisingly, I did not understand this at all, but clearly this
> relates to some of the postings in this group, so have at it and I'll try
> to follow.
>

​
The first warning sign that the article is probably worthless
​​
is
​ ​
that it
​ ​
was written by
​ ​
Robert Epstein, a
​ ​
psychologist and former editor of Psychology Today, a "science" that hasn't
discovered anything of much importance
​ ​
today or
​ ​
in decades. The second warning sign was in the
​ ​
ridiculous
​ ​
opening tag line "*Your brain does not process information, retrieve
knowledge or store memories*
​"​
.  So after that I just quickly skimmed the article, however one sentence
did catch my eye:

​> ​
> *the IP metaphor is, after all, just another metaphor*


​Years ago they said the brain ​was like a switchboard and that was indeed
a metaphor because a switchboard can't beat a human brain
at Chess or GO or Jeopardy, but a computer can.​
 And nobody would hesitate to call a human champion of those games
intelligent. And that's why a computer is more than just another metaphor.

​> ​a story we tell to make sense of something we don’t actually understand.


Richard Feynman felt that you don't really understand something until you
can do it, and I think he was right. If Mr. Epstein can make something that
behaves intelligently then his philosophy of mind would be worth studying,
until then it's just metaphorical hot air.

 John K Clark





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