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The Mind's I Has Two Eyes

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 January 2009

J. E. Martin  and
K. H. Engleman
J. E. Martin
Affiliation:
Pennsylvania State University
K. H. Engleman
Affiliation:
Pennsylvania State University
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Extract

In ‘Minds, Machines and Gödel’, 1961, J. R. Lucas proposed that Godel's theorem made possible a refutation of mechanism—the thesis that mind is wholly comprehensible as a consistent, rule-governed machine. A sympathetic reading of Lucas's argument might run something as follows: ‘If I am a machine then it will be possible in principle to give a specification of the consistent formal system, L, that represents me. If this formal system were handed to me, I would be able to prove a Gödel sentence, G, which L could not generate—that is, L could not model my proving G. But since I have proved G, L is inadequate as a model of my cognitive process.’

Type
Discussion
Information
Philosophy , Volume 65 , Issue 254 , October 1990 , pp. 510 - 515
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Institute of Philosophy 1990

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References

1 Lucas, J. R., ‘Minds, Machines and Godel,’ Philosophy 36, (1961) 112–27.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

2 Hofstadter, D. R. and Dennett, D. C., The Mind's I (New York: Basic books, 1981), 277–278.Google Scholar

3 Whiteley, C. H., ‘Minds, Machines, and Gödel: A Reply to Mr. Lucas’, Philosophy 37., (1962), 61.Google Scholar

4 The authors are grateful to G. B. Kleindorf er for his helpful suggestions and criticisms throughout this project.