Many cognitive scientists and modern thinkers equate our brain with digital computers. The brain's comparison to a modern machine is a trend seen throughout history. This comparison has helped shed light on the unique qualities of the brain by developing what intelligence is and more clearly what it is not. There are many core functional and structural components that differentiate us from any modern technology.
Computers are designed to and do a good job computing. The ever shrinking chip has allowed micro-processor speed to explode. Modern technologies even allow digital computers to process multiple computations at a given time. The most high tech machines are performing millions of operations per second. Some scientists and developers have even created machines that can sense and intake a great deal of information and store it in its memory. This is where brains and computers structurally and functionally diverge.
Brains integrate memory and computations while computers have separate compartments for memory and computation. This differentiation makes other similarities less important. The process of how brains and modern-day computers "think", compute and process is fundamentally different. It is not the number of connections of switches or neurons. Computers can integrate at least one million times the connections of a brain. It is not about the flow of information being sequential or parallel. It is an underlying difference of basic function that differentiates brains and computers.
Traditionally, computers are designed to output behavior. They are designed to do a specific task. This is why our idea of an intelligent robot is a human-like android that walks, talks and functions like humans. The best example would be Star War’s C-3PO. However, humans are not designed to just output complex, "intelligent" behavior. Brains are in charge of our bodily functions and allow us to adapt and modify our behavior to live and survive in modern day conditions. Its primary function is to monitor and execute all life-support and survival instincts. The brain develops a certain process of obtaining information and developing a model of the world. It is the how and the why that drive human brains as opposed to what output behavior defines intelligent computers.
Additionally, brains have the quality of being plastic. This is a plasticity that computers today and in the foreseeable future cannot obtain. If a computer’s storage memory is compromised or damaged, the information is lost. However, brains have the ability to develop new connections and can deal with minor “errors.” Computers struggle to adapt to error. Brains have the capacity to change, self-repair and self-correct which are key components of complex systems, while computers tend to be more programmed. The various capacities and capabilities of brains and computers can be seen in their unique architecture.
Finally, computers are extremely superior to brains when it comes to equating and processing numbers. For example, a computer can easily handle mathematical calculations and physics equations. In tests like the Turing Test, programmers often have to slow down the speed at which a computer gives an answer because it is so much faster than humans it would not seem natural to have an answer so quickly. On the other hand, modern-day computers struggle to recognize patterns. Humans have the unique ability to recognize faces from any angle, in any light and even with part of the face missing. Computers still struggle with pattern detection and identification problems such as facial recognition where humans are far superior (Hawkins, 2004).
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