Home
Rudy Garns's Library tagged → View Popular
Qualitative Experience in Machines
Lycan. Abstracted from ‘Qualitative experience in machines,’ The Digital Phoenix: How computers are changing philosophy.
Michael Gazzaniga: Split brains and other heady tales
Beyond the hype of left brain versus right brain lies the work of acclaimed neuroscientist Michael Gazzaniga. His career was forged in the lab of Nobel laureate Roger Sperry, and together their trailblazing experiments have illuminated the differences between the brain's two hemispheres. All In The Mind - 14 November 2009 -
The Problem Of Machine Intelligence
There have been many discussions relating to transhumanism and augmenting intelligence as well as just intelligence itself. However, at the heart of many of these discussions the subject of Artificial Intalligence (AI) emerges. This raises the question of whether AI is possible and what it actually means.
David Chalmers and the Singularity that will probably not come | Psychology Today
Yesterday I had the pleasure of seeing Chalmers in action live at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. He didn’t talk about zombies, telling us instead his thoughts about the so-called Singularity, the alleged moment when artificial intelligence will surpass human intelligence, resulting in either all hell breaking loose or the next glorious stage in human evolution — depending on whether you typically see the glass as half empty or half full. The talk made clear to me what Chalmers’ problem is (other than his really bad hair cut): he reads too much science fiction, and is apparently unable to snap out of the necessary suspension of disbelief when he comes back to the real world. Let me explain.
The zombification of philosophy (of mind)
David Chalmers is a famous philosopher of mind. His fame rests in great part on his 1996 book, The Conscious Mind: In Search of a Fundamental Theory. It’s too bad that the crucial idea behind the book, dualism, is hopelessly flawed, and -- more surprising yet -- that Chalmers got away with one of the most idiotic thought experiments ever, which a lot of people inexplicably seem to think is oh so very clever. This all came back to (my) mind because of a recent article in Philosophy Now by Rebecca Hanrahan (an assistant professor of philosophy at Whitman College in Washington state), who’s finally got the chutzpah to point out the obvious, telling it like it is about Chalmers’ famous “zombie argument.”
How Nonsense Sharpens the Intellect - NYTimes.com
Now a study suggests that, paradoxically, this same sensation may prime the brain to sense patterns it would otherwise miss — in mathematical equations, in language, in the world at large.
A debate in Nature on Darwin and the mind
Last April, Johan J. Bolhuis and Clive D. L. Wynne published in Nature (458(7240), 832-833) a paper entitled "Can evolution explain how minds work?" doubting the use and usefulness of evolutionary analysis in understanding cognitive mechanisms. In response, Lewis Wolpert ("Cognition: evolution does help to explain how minds work" in Nature, 459(7246), 506-50), Sara J. Shettleworth ("Cognition: theories of mind in animals and humans." in Nature, 459(7246), 506-506) and Frans B. M. de Waal ("Darwin's last laugh." in Nature 460, 175 (9 July 2009) freely available here) separately defended the use of evolutionary theory, and in particular comparative analysis, in the study of cognition.
What Is It Like To Be A Baby?: Scientific American
Jonah Lehrer chats with Gopnik about why babies might be more conscious than adults, the benefits of having an imaginary friend and why play, not necessity, is the mother of invention.
Robots evolve to deceive one another
In a Swiss laboratory, a group of ten robots is competing for food. Prowling around a small arena, the machines are part of an innovative study looking at the evolution of communication
The Origin of the Mind
The first step in figuring out how the human mind arose is determining what distinguishes our mental processes from those of other creatures
The Scope of Human Thought | Forum
Biologically, we resemble other animals, but mentally, we leave them in the dust. The scope of human thought is vast. Why are we so different?
FIVE PROBLEMS IN THE PHILOSOPHY OF MIND By Stuart Kauffman
I have presented the mind-brain identity theory in the context of two physical theories: first one in which a multiparticle quantum-classical system is capable of decohering reversibly to classicity, or classicity for all practical purposes. This allows mind to have consequences for brain without having to act by efficient cause on brain. This appears to resolve two outstanding problems in the philosophy of mind that have plagued us since Descartes: how the mind 'acts on' matter - it does so acausally via decoherence. How does mind act on mind - via the quantum decohering-recohering dynamical behavior of the mind-brain identity system. (Edge)
Mind, brain and self in the age of Facebook
A couple of years ago we organised a salon with Helen Birtwistle of the Institute of Ideas on the meaning of friendship, and the then quite new social networking sites such as Facebook. A US survey in 2004 had found that up to 25% of people claimed that they had no real intimates. Yet by 2007 there was networking technology where people would ask: ‘Can I be your friend?’ What is it all about? Why is it so important?
Secrets and Powers of the Brain | Channel N Video
Vision, the Brain and Memory: The ups and downs of forgetting (Samuel Wang)
Apes may imitate but they struggle to innovate
For all their cognitive prowessMovie Camera, chimpanzees will never build four-stroke engines, stone pyramids, or even a simple wheel. - 22 July 2009 - New Scientist
Selected Tags
Related Tags
Sponsored Links
Top Contributors
Groups interested in Mind
Highlighter, Sticky notes, Tagging, Groups and Network: integrated suite dramatically boosting research productivity. Learn more »
Join Diigo