Brain complexity: not at all a computer (Introduction)

by David Turell , Sunday, July 17, 2016, 21:29 (3051 days ago) @ David Turell

A different view of Epstein's essay with a comment on the meaning of genetic information:-https://sergiograziosi.wordpress.com/2016/05/22/robert-epsteins-empty-essay/-"Unfortunately, the essay is systematically wrong: virtually every key passage is mistaken, and yet, overall, it tries to make an argument that is worth making. Thus, I grew annoyed by the mistakes and misrepresentations (my immediate comment was “this is so wrong it hurts”), and then descended into anger because Epstein is actually damaging the credibility of an approach that I find promising, but is all too often misunderstood or straw-manned.-***- "First of all, the IP metaphor is pervasive because it's useful, as I've demonstrated above. Second, I've never heard, and have no need to deploy such a silly syllogism. The reasoning I'm defending is that it is reasonable to interpret complex control mechanisms in terms of information processing. Brains are complex control mechanism, and therefore it is reasonable to deploy the IP metaphor when describing and studying their inner workings.-***-"Embodiment is the surprisingly radical hypothesis that the brain is not the sole cognitive resource we have available to us to solve problems.-"To me, it is self-evident that this radical idea is basically correct, and at the same time, it is a reason why it is so difficult to figure out how brains work. One needs to account for much more than just neurons… At the same time, while I do accept the basic idea without reservations, I am also worried that, as exemplified by the short discussion I've linked above, radically rejecting all uses of the “representation” concept isn't going to work: what needs to be done is different, but perhaps something that is best left for another time.-"Overall, Cognitive Neuroscience is tricky, it is prohibitively hard, and, as I argue in the introduction here, it is of paramount importance to carefully select the correct metaphors in order to convincingly describe the vast number of different phenomena occurring at different scales (from the psychological, to the neural, down at least to the molecular). In this context, expecting that at one or more of these levels the IP metaphor will prove to be useful (as it is in the case of computers) is entirely justified."-Comment: I understand Epstein's point of view, that the brain is a helpful biological computer-like organ. But I also see the author's view that in acting like a computer it is hard to avoid making necessary comparisons. This article needs to be read in full to really follow the disagreements.-And there is an interesting comment on 'information':- Information is in the eye of the beholder, and that is precisely why it's a useful concept. Furthermore, it is entirely possible and appropriate to describe information in terms of underlying structures.-To make the concept even more clear, let's look at another biological phenomenon: inheritance and DNA. You can (and should) describe DNA in structural terms: things like the double helix, the shape of nucleotides, the molecular mechanisms of DNA replication, of protein synthesis and so forth. However, once all of the above is done, it is handy to also describe stretches of DNA in terms of pure information, namely the sequence of nucleotides, represented by the letters A, T, C and G. Thus a stretch of DNA can be effectively described by something like this A picture of the DNA code letters is given)-The image above is a representation of the gene which encodes for Insulin. Crucially, it is this kind of description which enabled the production of synthetic Insulin and thus the production of cheaper and safer medication. My point: both a purely structural and a purely information-centric descriptions of the Insulin gene are possible. The latter is more abstract, and because of that it is frequently more useful.-Comment: But the information contained in the letters is how to make insulin in the pancreas. Nowhere is that information seen in the above example, just the code for it, but that information must exist somewhere. We just don't see it and can't use it! Making synthetic insulin is by implanting the gene in bacteria which then dutifully produce insulin. We don't synthesize. They do!! We have no handle on the gene's instructions, which is information! Does this clarify the word 'information' for you?