Re: brains, telphones and microprocessors

Bruce Robinson (bruce.rob who-is-at btinternet.com)
Sat, 2 Oct 1999 17:24:09 +0100

> (Thorndike and Woodworth 1901) "The mind consisting not of large
capacities
> such as memory and reasoning waiting to be developed. but of "multitudious
> sperate individual functions", a kind of switch board with innummerable
> wires connecting discrete points."

I've a feeling (which may be wrong) that it was also in McCulloch and Pitt's
1944 paper on neuronal connection.

Bruce

> ----- Original Message -----
> From: George McKinlay <mckinlay who-is-at unr.edu>
> To: <xmca who-is-at weber.ucsd.edu>
> Sent: Saturday, October 02, 1999 1:34 AM
> Subject: brains, telphones and microprocessors
>
>
> >
> >
> > I remember reading an interesting analogy between the human brain and a
> telephone system, needless to say
> > it was a rather dated piece of work (the analogy I mean) but it did so
> much smack of the "brain as
> > computer" model that I thought it would be rather fun to do a little
> comparison... now my problem (among
> > others) is that my brain doesn't store information like a computer
does;
> so I have this rather vague
> > recollection about that work...
> >
> > Anybody out there know the source of my telephonic analogy
> >
> > Of course any other trivial trivia about treating the brain like a hunk
> of silicon would also be
> > appreciated
> >
> > Cheers
> >
> >
> >
> >
>
>