Put another way. Rothbard is saying that the method of our ratiocination must correspond to the level of sentience of the object of our ratiocination.
If we are deducing things about objects with no understanding, our rules of deduction must be of one sort. But if we are thinking about beings with brains, our rules of deduction must meet a higher standard.
I totally disagree and assert that such a thesis cannot be proven. I further go on a limb and assert that it defys common snese. Rules of deduction are always the same, no matter the subject.
Rothbard’s argument reminds me of the Marxian atitude that there is one logic for the rich, and another for the poor. Marx decided logic is different depending on the thinker. Rothbard is saying the rules are different depending on the subject. No way.
A final thought. A computer certainly cannot understand the intermediate steps of a logical chain of reasoning. It cannot understand anything. It is a dead lump of machinery. And yet one can create a program that wiil deduce things correctly about thinking human beings.
A final thought. A computer certainly cannot understand the intermediate steps of a logical chain of reasoning. It cannot understand anything. It is a dead lump of machinery. And yet one can create a program that wiil deduce things correctly about thinking human beings.
A computer (assuming the technology is availible) can do anything a brian can do. If brains can “understand,” so can computers.
How can Mu/P=Mu/P, an intermediate step, being translated into English and assert an actual thing about the world?
Then the analysis isn’t correct, since you aren’t describing how humans actually make choices. Economics tries to explain things how they occur in the real world. Neoclassical economics has a tendency to create mathematical worlds where individuals compute dozens of equations in their heads to make simple decisions in life. Whats the point of doing all of that if you aren’t actually explaining real world phemoneon?
Actors can certainly compute complicated equations trying to forecast expected class probabilities. But those are class probabilities, and the coins don’t have minds of their own, unlike humans. But this has nothing to do with the formation of price. Regardless of whether an actor computes extensive equations about probabilities of coins or to compare the efficiencies of different machines, he still treats them as goods and must rank them on value scales with units of money. Regardless of whatever the equations about our outcome, he still has to weigh the expected servicability of the good with forgoing money units. And that is where the value scale approach suceeds, because every step can coherently explain how individuals make purhcases.
Mathematical equations can lead to logically “correct” statements about human action. But as I stated earlier, are they logically correct statements that pertain to the real world? You can use functions that treat utility scales as continous, but humans only think in discrete units. Or how humans by X goods at Y price by choosing the optimal bundle of X goods along with Z goods based on how a particular indifference curve of bundles X/Z hit a particular budget constriant according to the price already posted. But none of that actually explains the formation of prices, nor how individuals conduct themselves in real life.
Care to elaborate? Deduction through electronics (or through thought) is different from senses and experience. No?
There is nothing special about being carbon based as opposed to silicon based which allows the brain to do things which a computer in principle can’t do. Is there anything specificaly about a brain which makes it unable to be replicated by a computer in your opinion?
I don’t know. Maybe. I just thing it’s bold to be certain it’s the case that a computer can do anything that a brain can do. I’m skeptical, either way.
What about the brain being carbon based makes it so special? Is there some algorithm which it can carry out that in principle cannot be carried out by a computer?
People think the brain is special because it’s carbon based?
People think the brain is special for a lot of fallacious reasons.
I don’t know. You tell us. You were the one so confident as to exclaim that a computer can do anything a brain can.
Okay then. No, there is no sequence of operations carried out by the brain which in principle cannot be carried out by a computer. The only difference betwen a brain and a computer other than the materials each are composed of is their degree of complication.
i dont think anyone knows what it is inside our skulls that make us self aware, or what lets us think about what we are thinking about. This latter is needed to produce a Godels theorem.
Oh guys, you made me laugh… Aren’t you assuming materialistic monism, at least for humans?
And who says human minds “carry out algorithms”? I mean, I have an algorithm in mind on how to make a sandwich, but I am not a number-crunching machine. Look, I think thoughts; I do not execute instructions like (0 volts AND 5 volts) fed through the right transistor yields 0 volts or anything like that. The computer does not “know” that 0 volts to me means “false,” and 5 volts, “true.”
Even in terms of the brain, the brain is a living organ, and it obviously functions differently from a microprocessor. For example, there are no logic gates in it.