Both of those arguments in no way counter the notion that the brain, as a physical device, can be simulated mechanically- they merely suggest that a simulation

Both of those arguments in no way counter the notion that the brain, as a physical device, can be simulated mechanically- they merely suggest that a simulation would have to be more fine-grained than neuroscience currently accepts. This is much like arguing that since Go has a massively larger game tree than Chess, writing a program to play Go as well as a human is impossible. Intractable? Maybe. Impossible? Clearly not. It's also worth quoting the second-to-last sentence of the second article you posted: "The book's thesis is considered erroneous by experts in the fields of philosophy, computer science, and robotics."