The difficult legacy of Turing's wager

Area of Science:

• Neuroscience
• Computational Neuroscience
• Philosophy of Mind

Background:

• The ambition to mathematically describe the human brain is a long-standing goal in neuroscience.
• Alan Turing's 1950 work highlighted the immense complexity and time required for such an endeavor.
• Significant advancements have been made in neuroscience over the past seventy years.

Purpose of the Study:

• To re-evaluate Alan Turing's 1950 arguments on the complexity of mathematically describing the human brain.
• To assess the continued relevance of Turing's predictions in light of seventy years of scientific progress.
• To present an opinion on the challenges and feasibility of creating a complete mathematical model of the mind.

Main Methods:

• The study is an opinion piece, critically analyzing historical arguments.
• It involves a conceptual review of Turing's 1950 predictions.
• It assesses the progress in neuroscience against Turing's original estimations.

Main Results:

• Turing's 1950 arguments regarding the time-consuming nature of describing the brain mathematically remain persuasive.
• Despite seventy years of advancements, the challenges highlighted by Turing persist.
• The complexity of the human brain presents ongoing difficulties for complete mathematical modeling.

Conclusions:

• The mathematical description of the human brain is an exceptionally complex challenge.
• Alan Turing's early estimations of the difficulty remain remarkably accurate.
• Further progress in neuroscience is needed to overcome the hurdles in creating comprehensive mathematical models of the mind.