Re: ANN: ai-philosophy group

From: ray scanlon (rscanlon_at_nycap.rr.com)
Date: 08/07/04 

Date: 6 Aug 2004 17:49:31 -0700

Lester Zick wrote:

> And that's the thrust of my question. How does one go about making a
> machine with a soul?

You don't. You don't talk about it. You don't even think about it. The
late Stephen Jay Gould wrote a delightful little book on this subject,
"Rocks of Ages". He talks about the magisterium of religion and the
magisterium of science. He promulgates the dictum of NOMA,
Non-overlapping magisteria.

The soul belongs to religion; the machine belongs to science.

Gould's personal struggle between the creationists on one hand, and
the evolutionists on the other lead to his book, really an extended
essay. He thought it a most profound mistake to mix the two
magisteria. Talk about the soul, or talk about the machine, but never
both. You pays your money and you takes your choice.

Please note that soul includes spirit, essence, psyche, mind,
consciousness, awareness, intelligence, intellect, mentality, self,
indivduality, persona, personality, executive function, conscious
mental field, self-awareness, sentience. Anyone who complains that
these words are not synonyms for soul doesn't understand the problem,
doesn't even understand that there is a problem.

An artificial neural net can be contrived by man to think and to
decide. The presence of absence of a soul (mind, etc., etc., etc.)
shall be willed by God, not man.

Ray

Most of what passes for dialogue on c.a.p. is hung up on violations of
NOMA.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: ANN: ai-philosophy group
    ... He promulgates the dictum of NOMA, ... > Non-overlapping magisteria. ... > The soul belongs to religion; ... > indivduality, persona, personality, executive function, conscious ...
    (sci.cognitive)
  • Re: ANN: ai-philosophy group
    ... > The soul belongs to religion; ... > indivduality, persona, personality, executive function, conscious ... conscience is that it is not reliant on the quantity ... and quality of input it receives from the attributes ...
    (sci.cognitive)