Philosopher argues the brain-computer metaphor is AI's fatal scientific error
AnnaCiaunica · x · 2026-11-09
IAI News publishes a 2,800-word essay by Dorothea Olkowski, Distinguished Professor of Philosophy at University of Colorado, Colorado Springs, attacking the foundational metaphor of modern neuroscience and AI: brain as hardware, mind as software.
Key claims:
- Consciousness originates not in the cortex (seat of reasoning and language) but in the ancient brainstem, steeped in hormones, emotion, and bodily chemistry
- The brain's signalling system is too chemically complex, too slow, and too entangled with the whole body to reduce to the binary logic underlying all computation
- If the premise fails, the argument that conscious AI is inevitable collapses
A philosophical counterpoint to mainstream AI assumptions, worth reading alongside technical debates.
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