On 26/10/2015 6:15 pm, Stathis Papaioannou wrote:
On 26 October 2015 at 17:51, Bruce Kellett <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:On 26/10/2015 5:32 pm, Stathis Papaioannou wrote:On 26 October 2015 at 17:08, Bruce Kellett <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>> wrote: On 26/10/2015 5:01 pm, Russell Standish wrote: On Mon, Oct 26, 2015 at 03:40:45PM +1100, Bruce Kellett wrote: I think Carroll's Paradox (or 'What the Tortoise Said to Achilles') effectively undermines computationalism, or any argument that arithmetic is prior to physics. See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_the_Tortoise_Said_to_Achilles In order to escape the paradox, you have to resort to a formalist approach, and that renders the formalism devoid of semantic content. I don't see why that undermines computationalism. Could you please expand? Modus ponens is only a formal manipulation of symbols, with no semantic content. This is an argument John Searle has made. The problem is, the brain can also be described as manipulating symbols with no semantic content - so where does semantic content come from?I can point at it, or when I kick the dog, he yelps. The same with an appropriately specified and programmed computer.
And on which reality is the computer running? Bruce -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
