Blog Entry #2: On Computers

Commentary

See what I have to say about Shena's and Vince's work.

References

Aristotle. (1994). On plants. In J. Barnes (Ed.), The complete works of aristotle (pp. 1252-1271). Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

On Computers

Intelligence and understanding is found in humans and computers; but while in some humans it is clearly manifest, in computers it is programmed and unnatural. For before we can assert the presence of true understanding in computers, a long inquiry must be held as to whether computers possess a soul a true capacity to understand. This inquiry, however, will not be performed here.

Some computers contain within them graphics processing units integrated into the motherboard. Some have stand-alone or third-party graphics processing units. Some have even two or three, and maybe one is used independently as a PhysX engine. Some components of the computer are simple, such as a radiated heatsink-cooled northbridge and an air-cooled southbridge; some are more complex, like a thermoelectrically-cooled processing core. Computers possess other various parts as well: SATA cables, power supplies, and peripheral ports.

Just as in the human, so also in the computer there are homogeneous parts: the case of the computer is like the skin of the human; the processor is like the brain; the data buses and cables are like nerves and veins; but that's pretty much it. If a computer had a stomach, it would probably be the hard drive, but that metaphor is a bit of a stretch, and so you should probably ignore it.

I suppose I could carry on forever, but alas, I am not a philosopher, but merely a student, a blogger no less, and this farce is but a travesty of the great works from minds much keener than mine.

Image courtesy of Corbis Images

So don't take me too seriously :)