Are we human, or are we information processors?

In "The Empty Brain," research psychologist Robert Epstein argues that human brains do not process, store, or retrieve information stored in memories. Rather, in a manner still not understood by neuroscientists, the brain changes after an experience & restructures its future behavior under certain conditions. Thus in the human brain there are no files stored; no cabinets exist with last year's W2 form & your fifth grade production of The Wizard of Oz. In this essay, I will examine the key points from Epstein's article, after which I turn to the unlikely insights from St. Augustine of Hippo. In short, we do not process information, but we are consistently experiencing formation.

The Information Processor (IP) Paradigm

Epstein's argument centers on the dominant paradigm in the neuroscience field—what he calls the Information Processor (IP) metaphor. Just as biologists research through the lens of evolutionary biology, neuroscientists research, formulate questions, and compare findings through a shared lens. Epstein even asked a panel of researchers to account for human behavior apart from the IP paradigm. Not one could offer a coherent response without reference to the IP paradigm. So, what is the IP paradigm? What does it offer the field of neuroscience? Finally, how did it arise as the universally-assumed lens for neuroscience research?

The IP paradigm sees human brains as a complex computer of sorts, a processor constantly responding to stimuli, regulating a complex internal system, & storing a catalogue of past experiences with conjoined responses. On this account, the mind is an ever-expanding algorithm for sensory input. Epstein situates the IP paradigm under the following logic:

Premise 1 - All computer are capable of behaving intelligently.

Premise 2 - All computers are information processors.

Conclusion - All entities that are capable of behaving intelligently are information processors.

Now to be fair, Epstein formulates the logic of the IP metaphor in a syllogism which does not allow for the complexity & nuance of a proponent for the IP metaphor. However, though most neuroscientists might add qualifications to the above conclusion, Epstein is arguing that in practice neuroscientists affirm the logic of the IP metaphor. It does give a general paradigm for the project & findings of contemporary neuroscience, which is (historically speaking) a young field.

Epstein situates the IP paradigm in our historical context as well. Drawing from George Zarkadakis's In Our Image, he argues that humanity consistently utilizes its most advanced technology as a lens to understand the mind & self. Hydraulics laid the foundation for the hydraulic paradigm of 'humors' to account for physical & mental functions. More complex machines gave rise to a mechanistic understanding of the body & mind, namely in the philosophical problem of Descartes's mind-body dualism. Maybe we're full of different liquids that affect our temperature & temperament. Maybe the mind is a 'ghost' controlling the advanced machine of the human body. Perhaps the brain is a super-complex computer, endowed with the pinnacle of input-response software to manage the hardware of the human body. Computers are arguably the most advanced tech humanity has, and as such, they have become our default paradigm to understand our own minds & bodies.

The problem with the IP paradigm, according to Epstein, is the problem with every metaphor. It is helpful up to the extent to which it begins to limit & distort our understanding of reality. Individual neurons do not store memories. If they did, then I could reproduce anything I've ever experienced in perfect detail. Now, it is true that computers were designed to quickly & accurately recall information based off of a programmed response to a specific input. But computers were designed by people to do something people cannot do, just as a pulley system was designed to lift what people cannot lift. People are more than information processors. So how may we understand what is happening in our minds? To propose an answer to this question, I turn to a man who never used or heard of a computer. And if Epstein is correct about the over-extension of the IP metaphor, perhaps Augustine may be uniquely qualified to answer this question.

Augustine on Memory & Mind

The central task of Augustine's Confessions is an introspective address to God through the medium of language from the annals of his memory. An account of memory, for Augustine, cannot begin with the technological creations of human beings (In Our Image). He turns to the mind itself, a mind he believes to be created in the Image of God. At this point I must remark that one cannot avoid the distinctly theological character of Augustine's formulations of mind & memory. Yet even as his views develop from earlier theories in Confessions to his most mature thought, Augustine's faith-grounded existential analysis of mind & memory affirms the similar thesis advanced by Robert Epstein. The human mind is not merely an information processor, but rather a complex consciousness that is subject to formation & re-formation.

Now, it may seem from the outset that I am cheating the game. "Of course Augustine does not hold the IP metaphor! It did not exist until seventeen-hundred years after his death! Moreover, what could he contribute to the budding field of neuroscience?" Here, I must acknowledge the contours of the field. I am tracing two quite different disciplines from two authors across nearly two millennia. Yet I stand my ground on the commitment to the unity of experience. For I too hold that the human mind is made in the Image of God. Though distended in time & language, steeped in finitude & temporality, I must still hold that an underlying thread unites the introspective human experience of mind & consciousness AND contemporary scientific projects to discover & study the very same mind & consciousness. I therefore must write as if they are playing on the same field, keeping vigilant care for distinctions & connections.

As Paula Fredrickson aptly summarizes,

And it is from here that Augustine sees the way that man is truly made most truly in God's image, for human thought, human memory, is purely nonmaterial. The memory of an object displaces no volume. Memory is the seat of human self-transcendence.

For Augustine, the human mind uses memory to understand & situate itself in the world. This non-material reflection must also involve the intellect and will, for we are not merely processing beings, but intending beings. It is in the willing/intending faculty of the mind that Augustine offers a helpful distinction for both the layman & the neuroscientist.

Augustine directs the Confessions to God, and his only resource for understanding who he is and what made him that way are his mind & memories. So what is Augustine trying to direct to God? He is tracing the key events of his life, not merely as an autobiographical offering, but as a re-formulation of the events which formed him. Where once the rods of his Greek teachers had formed Augustine to hate Greek, now his reflection yields a man understanding the correction & reproof of wayward desires. In short, Augustine only knows himself through his memory, through the events which formed him. He in turn offers himself, having been re-formed by the experience of Grace, to God.

According to Epstein, "A snapshot of the brain's current state might also be meaningless unless we knew the entire life history of that brain's owner—perhaps even about the social context in which he or she was raised." This is precisely what we see in Augustine's Confessions. It is not merely enough to have access to the hard drive. Mind & memory cannot be reduced to neural data storage, even if only on account of the formative & directive realities of our consciousness. On Epstein's account, we are organisms adapting to our environment. On Augustine's account, we are embodied beings constantly being formed and being re-formed by our own understanding & memory. On both accounts, we are not merely information processors. To be human will always, on all accounts, include more than inputs & responses.