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From: ted@imsvax.UUCP (Ted Holden)
Newsgroups: net.origins
Subject: the mamelian brain a kludge?
Message-ID: <362@imsvax.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 23-Jul-85 17:23:43 EDT
Article-I.D.: imsvax.362
Posted: Tue Jul 23 17:23:43 1985
Date-Received: Thu, 25-Jul-85 02:49:05 EDT
Organization: IMS Inc, Rockville MD
Lines: 21

I note with interest the remarks of Stanley Friesen concerning the mamelian brain.  To some extent he is right but, using computer phraseology, he is talking 
about hardware;  let's talk about software, the actual functioning of the mind.
I work with lots of different kinds of small computers for a living.  One of
the things I realized early on was that software (how intelligently a machine
is programmed) counts for more than hardware.  I'm always seeing situations
which involve a PC in one corner of an office, something considerably stronger,
say a Fortune 32:16 or a CT Miniframe in the other corner, the same kinds of
applications running on each, and the stuff on the PC running faster and better.
The differences in software simply overcome the hardware differences.  
    Look for a book by Eli Hellerman, one of the founders of computer science,
concerning the workings of the human mind.  This book is either out now or will
be out soon.  It will use the terms holography and resonance a great deal.  I
am no expert on these things, but I understand some of it.  Consider the way
a computer seeks to find one out of a million unsorted data items versus the
manner in which the human brain performs the same task.  The brain draws a 
resonant response from the data itself, likely using more than one key.  The computer must examine each item, one by one.  It's as if you were looking at a
million dog houses, one of which contained YOUR dog, but which one?  The com-
puter would search each doghouse.  The intelligent approach would be to whistle,
knowing that YOUR dog would hear and come running from whichever house he
was in, i.e. draw a response from the data itself.  That is what the brain does.
Which is the kludge?