Your brain does not process information, retrieve knowledge or store memories. In short: your brain is not a computer

the-podcast guy recently linked this essay, its old, but i don’t think its significantly wrong (despite gpt evangelists) also read weizenbaum, libs, for the other side of the coin

  • plinky [he/him]@hexbear.netOPEnglish
    4·
    6 months ago

    And computers can count, that’s all they can do as turing machines, we can’t or not that well, feels there is a mismatch here in mediums🤔. If I took 10 people knowing same poem, what are the odds I’ll get same word from all of them?

    Is that linked list in the brain can be accessed in all contexts then? Can you sing hip hop song while death metal backing track is playing?

    Moreover linked list implies middle parts are not accessible before going through preceding elements, do you honestly think that’s a good analogue for human memory?

    • m532 [she/her]@hexbear.netEnglish
      4·
      6 months ago

      Humans have fingers so they can count, so the odds 10 people get the same word should be 100%.

      I can plug my ears.

      I could implement a linked list connected to a hash map that can be accessed from the middle.

      • plinky [he/him]@hexbear.netOPEnglish
        3·
        6 months ago

        Lol @100 percent.

        So which one brain does? Linked list with hash maps then? Final simple computer analogy? Maybe indexed binary tree? Or maybe it’s not that?

        • m532 [she/her]@hexbear.netEnglish
          4·
          6 months ago

          When I want to recall a song, I have to remember one part, and then I can play it in my head. However, I can’t just skip to the end.

          Linked list

          • plinky [he/him]@hexbear.netOPEnglish
            2·
            6 months ago

            So if second verse plays you can’t sing along until your brain parses through previous verses? I find it rather hard to believe

            • m532 [she/her]@hexbear.netEnglish
              3·
              6 months ago

              Just because linked lists are usually implemented with a starting point doesn’t mean they have to. Content + a pointer to the next object is all that’s needed for an element of a linked list. It could even be cyclic.

          • plinky [he/him]@hexbear.netOPEnglish
            4·
            6 months ago

            you can try to find 200th word on physical book page, I suspect on first tries you’ll get different answers. It’s not dumbness, with poem it’s rather complicated counting and reciting (and gesturing, if you use hands), and direct count while you are bored (as in with book), might make mind either skip words, or cycle numbers. We aren’t built for counting, fiddling with complicated math is simpler than doing direct and boring count