Transistors and neurons, in Snow Crash and beyond

In an earlier post, Jeremy mentioned the book The Mind’s I by Daniel Dennet and Douglas Hofstadter. I’m glad he brought that up, because although I haven’t read The Mind’s I, I do know another book by Hofstadter, Gödel Escher Bach (GEB). Hofstadter is professor both of Cognitive Science and Computer Science, and in GEB he explores (among a great many things) how intelligent, meaningful systems can arise from simple, perhaps even deterministic material. In the human brain, the lower levels include neurons and the higher levels include our thoughts. In the analogous case of computers, the lower levels include transistors and all those ones and zeros, and the higher levels include complex software – or maybe even AI.

Hofstadter goes to great lengths to make the analogy between human brains and computers, and suggests that what can be done with one system should be possible in the other. Artificial intelligence would be a case of accomplishing with transistors what has already been done with neurons (remember, both are just atoms). Snow Crash explores the other possibility, at least on the surface: creating a biological virus that moves and behaves like a computer virus. The story in Snow Crash goes on to suggest that this has already been done, as long ago as Sumerian times. Although this is a fictional interpretation of ancient history and legend, the idea deserves real consideration. Might there not be qualitative differences (aside from the materials) between the way brains and computers handle meaning? If so, this would have enormous implications for digital media. Taking inspiration from Snow Crash, there might even be the possibility for the convergence of digital media with not only other types of media, but with human thought itself.