AI, OI (Organoid Intelligence), and Ersatz Incarnation: A Genealogy of Cognitive Science and Disappearance of the Human

“Organoid intelligence” (OI) is an emerging field that aims to leverage the processing power of the human brain, which has been shown to match supercomputer processing at a tiny fraction of the energy requirement. OI builds upon recent developments in brain organoids that promise to replicate aspects of learning and memory and possibly aspects of cognition in vitro. Brain organoids are networked together to form a biological computer. This paper argues that the idealization of the human brain as a computer already de-humanizes us. To this end, this paper offers a genealogy of cognitive science and its resultant disappearance of the human in two parts: (1) the spatialization of the mind, and (2) the cybernetic mechanization of the mind as computer. The resulting cognitive science and neuroscience simply assume the mind as a computer and an ersatz incarnation of a dataist metaphysics.