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Carpal Tunnel
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[Out on a limb e] I think the point of insel.'s originating post is about how we use language which is inherently inadequate to ascribe, describe, attribute, etc.
things. I had the feeling that anything that meets the requirement could have been used as an example, not just machines or consciousness.
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Pooh-Bah
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I'm writing an answer to several of your posts (this time I can't just fire a quip  ). In my first post, "strategy" is the operative term. The grisly images are part of the docu's strategy, the manipulation of our empathic response. The "AI" question is not central; empathy is. As to AI, the argument that has been attributed to me is not the one I'm attempting--successfully or not--to touch on. IP
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Carpal Tunnel
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Sorry, IP, I was actually responding to Helen's post more than yours, and perhaps not even that. Probably I should have made it a [rant]. I have suffered for years (ever since I wrote a dissertation on natural language processing for a post-grad diploma) from hearing those around me saying things like "machines will be able to think soon". That's codswallop. They may well be able to process information in a way which appears to the casual observer to be based on human thought processes, but it won't be real. It'll all be clever programming which mimics the external manifestations of thought, that's all. I'm sure we've all heard of the "Eliza" program and the urban mythology surrounding it. And that's as close as we're likely to get for some time. Of course, I'm almost always wrong when predicting information processing trends. So the first successful "Deep Thought" computer is probably being commissioned right now! 
The idiot also known as Capfka ...
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old hand
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Starting from the assumption that the present thread is a representative example of human thought output, I am quite convinced a machine will never match it: by definition, machines are just not sufficiently chaotic.
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old hand
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I don't know if this is off-thread, or if this entire thread is off-topic, or if it all makes sense somewhere, but...
1. To speak of machines as never being able to think is probably meaningless - by almost any definition of the word, we humans are machines, and it is patently obvious that we think.
2. If you speak only of 'artificial' machines, you are still faced with the problem of defining what you mean by artificial. Let's say you claim it is:
a. a deliberate product
b. one that whould not have occurred 'in the course of nature'
c. one created by humans
Even with all these in mind, a 'test tube' baby fits the bill.
What happens, IMO, in all this discussion of machines, is that same technophobia that Asimov tried to counter with his Three Laws of Robotics. We do not wish to believe that humans can create 'non living' (whatever that term means) entities that demonstrate consciousness.
I deliberately used the word 'demonstrate' in that last sentence, because not one of us, apart from the personal example, has any idea of anybody else possessing consciousness except by an analysis of that person's behaviour. If you judge me to be conscious because of my behaviour, then you must judge as conscious any entity that shows similar behaviour - you cannot have it both ways and stick to some 'essentialist' idea of humanity - particularly given that we only have the words on our screens as evidence of any of the ayleurs' consciousness (though Jackie may get the dubious pleasure of meeting the android called Shanks shortly!).
The only other argument, then, must hinge upon some notion that it is practically impossible to design and programme a non-human entity with the capacity to demonstrate human-like behaviour. To this, some ripostes:
1. We already have computers with storage and processing capacity rivalling, and in fact beating, that of the human brain.
2. With advances in the theory and practice of parallel processing, connectionism, and modular notions of mind (read Pinker, Dennett et al), it would be a brave person who would bet against the creation, within a generation or so, of a non-human entity with the capacity to do a darn sight more than Eliza.
3. The Godelian argument, as recently advanced by Penrose and others, is deeply flawed (discussion available privately, on another thread, or a different board altogether, if wanted).
That's my take, anyway.
the sunshine ("Campaign for silicon rights") warrior
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Carpal Tunnel
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I'm in your camp on this one, Shanks. As to what our concepts of 'rights' will mean in that brave new world... machines are just not sufficiently chaoticYes, Werner, but give Bill Gates another stab at it... 
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Pooh-Bah
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If someone cries out in pain, I have no doubt of their experience. It is this phenomenon, which is not formally meaning, that I am calling "empathy"
Excuse me for taking this apart some more: The first sentence implies that this is an unfailing,
Point taken. It is not unfailing. Why and when it might fail is a question of some interest to, for example, psychologists and to those, as I have suggested, who might concern themselves with how holocausts come about, to name two.
quasi-automatic reaction of you as a human being. But the remainder of your argument suggests that you regret the very fact that empathy is not general, but has to be taught, and can be "manipulated".
Where do I say empathy has to be taught? That it can be manipulated is indisputable, as is its significance in human relations.
A quality which would be inborn/instinctive could not be considered part of ethics, because, as I see it, ethics is about conscious social behavior.
Can you advance anything other than egoism without it?
Now something rather provocative: Is there really a categorical difference between the first, purely emotional reaction on hearing someone cry out in pain on one hand, and witnessing a valuable object (like a brand-new car) going to pieces in a crash, on the other hand?
Obviously, there is. I don't feel empathy for cars, not even Ferraris.
What I want to demonstrate is a warning not to stylize every pinching gut-feeling as empathy.
a) are you assuming I do?
b) you are distinguishing the despair at a lost investment from empathy, for example, for the person pinned behind the wheel. Either we are already agree, or you have answered your own question.
IP
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Pooh-Bah
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IP: Very soon, we will say machines think as we do, consciously.
MK: The effort to make them do so is wasted time and an endeavor only taken seriously by those who are looking to become completely lazy, or isolated from the divergence that individual beings bring.
True or not, this is not on point.
IPIt won't be because we have any idea what consciousness is. But we will mean something when we say it. And that we will say it--and, finally, forget to say it--has a meaning of its own.
MK: Meaning implied by only verbal existence (or lack thereof) is "full of holes" - "The lerprechan rode my blue unicorn" is understandable, but means little (aside from aesthetics)
This is implicit in the statement you seek to refute: "It won't be because we have any idea what consciousness is"
IP: Machines will think as we do when we recognize them doing so.
MK: You're starting to sound like a machine.
I either deny this or take it as a compliment, depending on your meaning.
IP: We will not come to realize that machines think through analysis, machines will come to think when we have empathy for them.
MK: I'd be more inclined to say that that empathy will come when they have empathy for us (which will never happen).
Please see my response to Bridget. I will try to post it today.
IP: Machines have been cultivating empathy in us for a long time.
MK: Maybe in materialists in general, and certainly "consumers" whether they use the machines or not, but leave me out of "us".
Your concerns betray a familiarity with the phenomenon I am portraying with hyperbole. We are in agreement on this: your sentiments and my point coincide exactly.
IP
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Pooh-Bah
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If you judge me to be conscious because of my behaviour, then you must judge as conscious any entity that shows similar behaviour - you cannot have it both ways and stick to some 'essentialist' idea of humanity
This is the only post that addresses the point. I don't agree with your criteria for defining machine, but I won't take it up with you.
Since it is the only point with real relavance to language itself, I will add that the notion of consciousness is suspect for the very reason you assert observed behavior as the sole criterion for imputing it. As something utterly private, consciousness is not something around which there can be an evolved language. If the concept lies outside the horizon of language, both the term and its assertion are meaningless. This may spur controversy best avoided (I've learned my lesson). Suffice it to say, an analysis of certain forms of speech reveals an inadequacy of the term to its purported meaning:* we think we mean things which cannot be meant. That takes it a step past shank's point, but without changing direction.
IP
*[I-realize-I've-set-myself-up-for-a-dig emoticon]
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Carpal Tunnel
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This little tale I am bout to recount is nowhere as erudite as the discussion so far but I sometimes have more courage than sense.
A science fiction story published in the 1960s told this story which I abridge for time/space.
Comes a time when all the computers in the world are to be linked. The final connection is set to happen in a big ceremony to be televised world-wide. After a huge discussion about who would make the physical connection and what would be the first question. It was decided the techs who did the work would make the physical connection. And they did. The first question asked by a committee of world leaders was : "Is there a God?" The computers whirled and blinked and then -- as the world listened -- the answer came : "There is now."
wow
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