Reviews

Plato's Camera: How the Physical Brain Captures a Landscape of Abstract Universals by Paul M. Churchland

drs's review against another edition

challenging informative medium-paced

4.5

In Plato’s Camera Paul M. Churchland argues that the proper model for how information is stored in the brain is found in the mathematical language of linear algebra and vector spaces. This theory is materialist (specifically neurologically-based) and extensible to non-human animals since it rejects the idea that concepts and learning are inherently lingua-formal. Support for his theory comes both from empirical evidence of the structure and functioning of the brain—as increasingly well-mapped by new technologies—and from the results and mathematical formalisms of artificial neural networks, specifically recurrent neural networks.