I think it is precisely the incompressible set of "rules" that we associate
with humanity that makes the reductionist view improbable. My wife may say
the same thing to me 10 different times, with me reacting in the same way,
but on the eleventh time, I might surprize her by getting angry or
frustrated or whatever.
If humanity can be reduced to a set of rules then they are not human.
>
>When it comes down to it, I think the criteria or comparisons
>that we're talking about relate to the mind of man rather than
>the spirit. Along these lines let me propose a question. I should
>save this for Jim but hey, there's no rule against asking the
>same question twice. Let's suppose that 10 years from now
>some clever engineer makes a computer that passes Von Neumanns
>test (for sake of time and space I'll assume people know what this
>is, if not I can elaborate). If so would you conclude that the machine
>is thinking? And if so, would you include it in humanity? If not,
>why? It seems Von Neumanns criteria is similar to what you're
>proposing. [BTW, for sake of clarity, I don't believe Von Neumann
>proposed that such a machine would be human, only that it
>would be thinking].
First, I will explain a Von Neumann test. This is the test that must be
passed in order for a computer scientist to say that they have created
artificial intelligence. It is passed, if a person in a room, communicating
via computer terminal with a human and a computer is unable to tell the
difference between the two conversations. This has all sorts of interesting
variation like the chinese translating box and others.
Now, I would suggest that humans over the past 4 centuries have been forced
to engage in a von Neumann test on a large scale. During the age of
discovery, Europeans met many other cultures. At first both sides did not
view the other as a fellow human. Both sides felt that the other was not
human. Eventually with lots of bumps and problems, everyone has been forced
to conclude that those who do not look like us are indeed human. The
biggest piece of evidence was that that other fellow over there, the one
that looks so wierd, acts just like me. I am human, therefore he must be human.
As to the eventual computer von Neuman test, I worry a lot about that.I have
seen estimates that at current rates of increases of computer speed, by 2025
we should have a computer with enough memory and speed to rival our brains.
We will then know if AI is possible. But one other thing is certain. If a
machine acts like me, it will most assuredly be used by antitheists as
evidence that spirituality IS just so much blather.
glenn
Foundation, Fall and Flood
http://www.isource.net/~grmorton/dmd.htm