At any rate, my focus here is not on the CTM itself, but on whether it is a theory (in the scientific sense of the term) or what I (and others) refer to as an account, or view (in the philosophical sense). Even a superficial glance at the literature on the CTM will show clearly that it is in no sense a scientific theory. It does not have a lot of empirically verifiable content, and much of the debate on it has occurred within the philosophical literature, using philosophical arguments (and thought experiments). This is to be contrasted with actual scientific theories, let’s say the rival theories that phantom limbs are caused by irritation of severed nerve endings or are the result of a systemic rearrangement of a broad neuromatrix (in Ronald Melzack’s phrasing) that creates our experience of the body. In the case of phantom limbs the proposed explanations where based on previously available understanding of the biology of the brain, and led to empirically verifiable predictions that were in fact tested, clearly giving the edge to the neuromatrix over the irritated nerve endings theory.
​Remember, philosophy moves in conceptual, rather than empirical space (though of course its movements are constrained by empirical knowledge), and its goals have to do with the clarification of our thinking, not with the discovery of new facts about the world. So it is perfectly sensible for philosophers to use analogies (the mind is like a computer) and to work out the assumptions as well as the implications of certain ways of thinking about problems.
This distinction between philosophical accounts and scientific theories, then, helps further elucidate the relationship between (some branches of) philosophy and science. Philosophers can prepare the road for scientists by doing some preliminary conceptual cleaning up. At some point, when the subject is sufficiently mature for actual empirical investigations, the scientists come in and do the bulk of the work (and all the actual discoveries). The role of the philosopher, then shifts toward critically reflecting on what is going on, occasionally re-entering the conceptual debate, if she can add to it; at other times pushing the scientist to clarify the connection between empirical results and theoretical claims, whenever they may appear a bit shaky. And the two shall live happily together ever after.
Must the computation be digital for the CTM?