Machines and Human Consciousness
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Machines and human consciousness
In todays world, we live in a very complicated and complex society, and in this society, we divide objects into two different categories – those which think, and those which do not. When we are considering about thinking objects, we obviously think of human, monkeys, dogs or cats. When we are considering non-thinking objects, we think of bricks, biscuits or probably plants on the other hand. Moreover, objects that think, does not always seem like thinking all the time, for example such as sleeping. However, objects that do not think are without thoughts and consciousness all the time.
“Conscious being is one which has that feature which you and I have when we are awake but lack when we are asleep. Conscious beings are not necessarily always conscious, whilst the other sort never are.”
So, do we classify A.I as a thinking object in the same sense that human beings do too? Indeed, it is a question that everybody asks, and had puzzled many scientists and philosophers in the past and even today. It is a question of which that lies in the field of Artificial intelligent, could any men made machine ever be thinking with the full sense of
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consciousness? Indeed as John McCarthy stated, “Artificial intelligence cannot avoid philosophy”. The big question will begin.
Consciousness
Before going any further, let us talk about how to determine if we are conscious or not. If we take a moment to think about it, it is actually very easy to discover whether a person is conscious or not. When a person is conscious, they tend to move, talk, and respond to many “external stimuli”. Some examples would be kicks, punches and pinches, if that person were perhaps conscious, it would react towards those actions, dodge either it or self-protect. However, if a person is unconscious, it tends not to react to those actions, and tends to remain stationary and relatively quiet. A person with no consciousness will simply react in an abnormal way, it does not feel any pain what so ever. Perhaps you would noticed already that I have only used the word “tend to” to describe consciousness, this is because there are many factors involved whether how to determine a human being is conscious or not during a sleepwalk or a daydream. However, in this case it will not alter the fact that we are perhaps conscious with no doubt. It is also perhaps hard to accept that some physical creatures that do all these things, but yet they are simply a shell without conscious, have no point of view on this world and simply a creature that has an outside but no inside.
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Mind and body problem
If in any sense that consciousness has something to do with the behavior of our body, then we must also look at the Mind-Body Problem. According to Descartes theory, the body and the mind itself are two completely different things, although that they are connected in some way. Before we go on, let us close your five senses, ear, mouth, eye, touch and nose. If by any chance for a moment, that nothing exists and you can concentrate purely on your own mind or consciousness. Then according to Descartes, it is logical that you can exist, even without your body directly connected with your mind. If this is true, then we can conclude the fact that the mind is a complete different and independent thing away from the body. In addition, as Descartes has stated in this argument, “I think, there fore I am”, “this is needless to say that we cannot doubt our own existence, for the very act of doubting itself inevitably involves the existence of the person doing the doubting.” We must accept the existing connection between the mind and the body because; naturally, the mind must be able to control the bodys movements, which by far it is depended to our own free will. The body must also be able to affect the mind, “since much of what we know in our minds has to originate with the sense organs of the body.” Many of us might wonder why the mind and body discussions are so important towards machine consciousness. Well, by attempting to separate the mind from the physical world, the body, we can then relate to Descartes idea of that “the world is not necessarily the same as the structure of its subject matter.” Secondly, once the mind and the body are separated from each other, “we can then find it necessary to reconnect the
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