Path: utzoo!utgpu!watserv1!watmath!att!bellcore!rutgers!cs.utexas.edu!ut-emx!churchh
From: churchh@ut-emx.UUCP (Henry Churchyard)
Newsgroups: comp.ai
Subject: Re: Hayes vs. Searle
Summary: summarize Penrose book (ha ha ha)
Message-ID: <31729@ut-emx.UUCP>
Date: 16 Jun 90 01:25:19 GMT
References: <16875@phoenix.Princeton.EDU> <2629@skye.ed.ac.uk> <3305@se-sd.SanDiego.NCR.COM>
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas
Lines: 18

In article <3305@se-sd.SanDiego.NCR.COM> Jim Ruehlin writes: 

>> Penrose book (_The_Emperor's_New_Mind_, 1989), where he argues that
>>brain tissue might be different because of quantum mechanical
>>effects.  I'm not saying that this position is necessarily correct,
>
> Can you give more details on this book, Penrose's arguments, etc.?

   I've only read the first few chapters so far, and Penrose covers
wide areas of the theory of Physics, so peeking at the end doesn't
really help!  I can say, however, that Penrose's objections come out
of the details of heoretical physics, rather than the more abstract
philosophical considerations raised by Searle.  (Penrose is an actual
theoretical physicist/mathemetician who worked closely with Hawking in
the past, so that his use of QM is _not_ a vague pseudo-mystical
tao/zen-ish kind of thing!)  Sorry I can't be of more help yet...

             --Henry Churchyard