Is the Brain a Computer?
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With an account, you can revise, criticize, and comment on ideas.Anything that processes information is a computer.
The brain processes information.
Therefore, the brain is a computer.
Yes, and I can accept that the brain is a computer.
But, we might make a number of subsequent moves.
The mind is a computer. An individual person is a computer.
And yes, "not the kind of computer people traditionally think of when they hear the term, like a laptop or desktop," as Dennis states below.
But, the term 'computer' implies deterministic connotations.
David Deutsch and others talk about the 'creative program' each human possesses. This also implies determinism.
I know that David Deutsch and Karl Popper strongly side with free will in the free will / determinism debate.
But how do we articulate and explain a computer and creative program with freedom, free will, choice, agency, and autonomy?
The mind is a computer. An individual person is a computer.
No, the mind is a program. A computer is a physical object; the mind is not.
In a Deutschian understanding, ‘person’ and ‘mind’ are synonymous. So a person isn’t a computer, either. A person is also a program.
@nick-willmott, you objected to "a brain is a computer." Would you also object to "a mind (a person) is a program?" Why or why not?
Think we're going to get bogged down in unclear relationships to tackle this sorry...
If anything that processes information is a computer, do all computers have programs?