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Lucas and Penrose vs. Computationalism: A Refutation of the Gödel-arguments

Nygren Löhndorf, Leonard LU (2021) FTEK01 20211
Theoretical Philosophy
Abstract (Swedish)
John Lucas and Roger Penrose attempted to refute Computationalism, the theory that the human mind is a computational system. They did so by utilizing meta-mathematical proofs by Kurt Gödel. I will explore various objections made against the attempt and discover that it relies on two uncertain premises – human consistency and proof for the consistency of a formal system. Revisions of the argument are made to avoid the second premise, but the first premise remains. In addition to the assumed premises, various technical objections have been made against Lucas’ and Penrose’s arguments. Lucas and Penrose’s attempt at refuting Computationalism ultimately fails because of the technical objections and the lack of a cogent proof for human... (More)
John Lucas and Roger Penrose attempted to refute Computationalism, the theory that the human mind is a computational system. They did so by utilizing meta-mathematical proofs by Kurt Gödel. I will explore various objections made against the attempt and discover that it relies on two uncertain premises – human consistency and proof for the consistency of a formal system. Revisions of the argument are made to avoid the second premise, but the first premise remains. In addition to the assumed premises, various technical objections have been made against Lucas’ and Penrose’s arguments. Lucas and Penrose’s attempt at refuting Computationalism ultimately fails because of the technical objections and the lack of a cogent proof for human consistency. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
author
Nygren Löhndorf, Leonard LU
supervisor
organization
course
FTEK01 20211
year
type
M2 - Bachelor Degree
subject
keywords
Computationalism, Mechanism, Kurt Gödel, logic, incompleteness, metamathematics
language
English
id
9061763
date added to LUP
2021-10-04 09:20:25
date last changed
2021-10-04 09:20:25
@misc{9061763,
  abstract     = {{John Lucas and Roger Penrose attempted to refute Computationalism, the theory that the human mind is a computational system. They did so by utilizing meta-mathematical proofs by Kurt Gödel. I will explore various objections made against the attempt and discover that it relies on two uncertain premises – human consistency and proof for the consistency of a formal system. Revisions of the argument are made to avoid the second premise, but the first premise remains. In addition to the assumed premises, various technical objections have been made against Lucas’ and Penrose’s arguments. Lucas and Penrose’s attempt at refuting Computationalism ultimately fails because of the technical objections and the lack of a cogent proof for human consistency.}},
  author       = {{Nygren Löhndorf, Leonard}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  note         = {{Student Paper}},
  title        = {{Lucas and Penrose vs. Computationalism: A Refutation of the Gödel-arguments}},
  year         = {{2021}},
}