Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83 based; site hounx.UUCP
Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxr!mhuxt!houxm!hounx!kort
From: kort@hounx.UUCP (B.KORT)
Newsgroups: net.math
Subject: Re: Turing Equivalence of Human Information Processing
Message-ID: <403@hounx.UUCP>
Date: Sun, 17-Nov-85 23:30:10 EST
Article-I.D.: hounx.403
Posted: Sun Nov 17 23:30:10 1985
Date-Received: Mon, 18-Nov-85 07:47:00 EST
References: <10810@ucbvax.UUCP> <>, <4932@cca.UUCP>
Organization: AT&T Bell Labs, Holmdel NJ
Lines: 12

I agree with Christopher Reedy that a human with access to the
world's libraries has information processing capabilities equivalent
to a Turing machine with unlimited external memory.  (We are ignoring
the time-efficiency issue, of course, when we speak of Turing-equivalence.)
Nevertheless, there do seem to be some functions of the brain that
transcend pure information processing.  I suspect these have to do
with survival instincts, healing, and propagation of the species.  (This
is not to say that a race of machines couldn't be created with these
additional properties.  But I don't think they are inherent in a Turing
machine.)
--Barry Kort