Template:M intro technology rumours of our demise: Difference between revisions

Template:M intro technology rumours of our demise (view source)

Revision as of 22:25, 20 November 2023

18 bytes added , 20 November 2023

→‎Body and mind as metaphors

Amwelladmin

Bureaucrats, Interface administrators, Administrators

83,198

edits

@@ Line 133: / Line 133: @@
 We are used to the “[[Turing machine]]” as a [[metaphor]] for “mind” but, for these reasons, it is a bad metaphor. It is unambitious. It does not do justice to the human mind.
-Perhaps we could invert it, and use “body” '''—''' in that dishonourably dualist, [[Descartes|Cartesian]] sense — as a [[metaphor]] for a Turing machine, and “mind” for natural human intelligence. “Mind” and “body” in this sense, are a practical guiding principle for the [[division of labour]] between human and machine: what goes to “body”, give to a machine — motor skills; temperature regulation; the pulmonary system; digestion; aspiration  — the conscious mind has no business there. There is little it can add. It only gets in the way. There is compelling evidence that when the conscious mind takes over motor skills, things go to hell.<ref>This is the premise of Daniel Kahneman’s {{br|Thinking: Fast and Slow}}, and for that matter, [[Matthew Syed]]’s {{br|Bounce}}.</ref>
+Perhaps we could invert it. We might instead use “body” — in that dishonourably dualist, [[Descartes|Cartesian]] sense — as a [[metaphor]] for a Turing machine, and “mind” for natural human intelligence. “Mind” and “body” in this sense, are a practical guiding principle for the [[division of labour]] between human and machine: what goes to “body”, give to a machine — motor skills; temperature regulation; the pulmonary system; digestion; aspiration  — the conscious mind has no business there. There is little it can add. It only gets in the way. There is compelling evidence that when the conscious mind takes over motor skills, things go to hell.<ref>This is the premise of {{author|Daniel Kahneman}}’s {{br|Thinking, Fast and Slow}}, and for that matter, [[Matthew Syed]]’s {{br|Bounce}}.</ref>
 But leave interpersonal relationships, communication, perception, [[construction]], decision-making in times of uncertainty, imagination and creation to the mind. ''Leave the machines out of this''. They will only bugger it up. Let them ''report'', by all means. Let them assist:  triage the “conscious act” to hive off the mechanical tasks on which it depends.<ref>{{Author|Julian Jaynes}} has a magnificent passage in his book {{br|The Origins of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind}} where he steps through all the aspects of consciousness that we assume are conscious, but which are not.