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147 sats \ 4 replies \ @Scoresby 10 Jun \ on: Is the brain a biological computer? AskSN
In my mind, computer implies determinism: if you know the inputs, you know the outputs.
I believe human brain (somehow) cannot be predicted. Human brains can produce surprising outputs from known inputs.
I don't think it's all just a matter of complexity.
Just because you personally can't predict it doesn't mean the logical structure for predictability is not in place.
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Well, sure, but I was trying to refer to the impossibility of prediction by anyone.
I'm realizing prediction is not the right word. Determined by is more what I mean, but it is clunkier.
A computer will have certain circuits light up because of certain inputs. Neural circuits in a human brain may light up because of certain inputs...or they might not.
Sure, I may not be able to perceive the true logical structure of human brains, but I may choose to reason about them anyway, or I may not. I'm not sure this is true of a computer.
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The circuits that light up do so stochastically as a function of inputs. If you clamp these, you get neural activation that is not mysterious, even if unknowable by you (or anyone). That's the heart of the problem with the "unknowable" critique.
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I thought Brett Weinstein had a good point about this. Consciousness presumably carries a cost, as most adaptations do. So, it must do something to justify that cost.
The most obvious thing it might be doing is making better decisions, which implies that we’re not fully predictable.
That’s a fairly condensed version of his argument, but I think you can see what he’s driving at.
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