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My thought experiment question around Psychiatry is: How would pre-electricity age people explain the operations of a digital computer? They would probably inve
by lebuffon 4y ago
My thought experiment question around Psychiatry is:
How would pre-electricity age people explain the operations of a digital computer?
They would probably invent some theories that bore no resemblance to the actual underlying technology. They might be close and even create some relevant metaphors but the theory would never be "correct", I suspect. Is this analogous to Psychiatry?
An old engineering axiom is:
"If you can't build it, you don't really understand it"
This leads me to ask, will we only understand the human mind after we learn how to build one or two?
Notwithstanding the question, can a network with X neurons fully comprehend a network with X neurons?
- dmarchand90 4y agoThe mechanistic view of the universe is ancient and thinking of things as a set of motion induced cause/ effect dates back at least to Democritus. The ancient Greeks had mechanical computers for astronomy. And mechanical automata have been around for a long time. Depends on the definition of understand. If you mean complete and faithful reproduction then maybe not. At least in one mind. Definitely a set of N minds with X-1 neurons can together understand the whole of X neurons if each simulates under given conditions or subsets of the whole. The mind also probably has a degree of fractal self similarity in its structure and understanding a part gives a representation of the whole.
- IIAOPSW 4y agoA Turing machine can simulate the operation of any other Turing machine, so maybe there's hope for a ball of X neurons.
- Bakary 4y agoWe don't need to understand all of the workings of the human brain. We need to provide a way for patients to be able to deal with their psychological burdens and establish mental self-sufficience.