Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!usc!samsung!infinet!sena
From: sena@infinet.UUCP (Fred Sena)
Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy
Subject: Re: how many distinct thoughts can a person have?
Message-ID: <2773@infinet.UUCP>
Date: 25 Jun 91 17:50:32 GMT
References: <1991Jun19.033316.18773@athena.mit.edu> <1991Jun20.083708.13355@tygra.Michigan.COM> <2772@infinet.UUCP>
Reply-To: sena@infinet.UUCP (Fred Sena)
Distribution: usa
Organization: Infinet, Inc.  North Andover, MA
Lines: 40


>In article <1991Jun19.033316.18773@athena.mit.edu> mlevin@jade.tufts.edu writes:
>>   I was just reading Z. Pylyshin's "Computation and Cognition", and
>>at one point, he states something like: "the number of distinct human
>>thoughts is uncountable." Does anyone have any arguments for or
>>against the idea that the number of possible distinct human thoughts
>>(or mental states) is uncountably infinite? ... It seems plausible to me;
>>does anyone have a good argument either way?
>>
>>Mike Levin

I think that there is some confusion here between "uncountable" and "infinite".
I don't believe that they are the same thing at all because I think that
there are many things that are uncountable yet finite.

For example, if I were to ask you the number of cars that are running on the
roads at a particular instant, the number would be uncountable because you
can't be everywhere at once to count them and the number of cars would change
as you were in the process of counting.  I think that everyone would agree
that the number would be finite as well, since there are a finite number of
cars.

I think that the reason why thoughts in the brain are uncountable is because
the brain is an uncertainty machine.  You cannot measure the number of
thoughts because all forms of measurement will cause the actual state to
change.  As soon as you ask someone how many thoughts they are having, you
are changing the number of thoughts that they have because they have to start
to think about you question instead of whatever they were spontaneously
thinking before you asked them.

Besides, what do we consider to be a "thought" anyways.  It's not exactly
something that you can really measure.   Do you count words, symbols, or both?
The subconscious speaks to the conscious through symbols.

	--fred

-- 
--------------------------------------------------
Frederick J. Sena                sena@infinet.UUCP
Memotec Datacom, Inc.  N. Andover, MA