Aeon classic revisited: your brain does not process information and is not a computer
AnnaCiaunica · x · 2026-10-05
Robert Epstein's Aeon essay "The empty brain" is being recirculated: the brain does not store, retrieve, or process information like a computer.
- Epstein argues neuroscience will never find copies of Beethoven's Fifth, words, images, or grammar rules in the brain — even "memories" don't exist as people imagine.
- The information-processing metaphor took hold after the invention of computers in the 1940s and has dominated psychology and neuroscience for over half a century.
- He uses newborns as evidence: babies come equipped with reflexes and social instincts rather than stored data.
- Often cited in AI-era debates to challenge the assumption that AI and human intelligence are fundamentally alike.
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