We are no different than computers

[The Grand Nudger]

But when a human (and some monkeys) lies, they employ theory of mind, empathy, creativity, and a desire gain a benefit. A computer will lie when it's told.

-and so will a human being.
Those are all relevant topics, to mind...but they are all additional to mind..and as I;ve mentioned before, if we just keep adding modifiers until the only thing left that fits the bill are human beings..we will have proven only that a computer is not a human being.  To which I say "no shit".....but we're talking mind,eh?

Comp mind, to reiterate, postulates as to -how- a mind is actually doing all of that empathy and creativity business. How it;s comparing gain to loss. A method, a manner in which it can be done. It doesn't propose that machines and human beings will have the same goals or value judgments. It doesn't propose that a "machine mind" would be a human mind. It proposes that both machines and human mind leverage similar principles to similar effects. It gives us an idea as to how a memory or concept is/could be made, not what associations we assign to it (as with lying above).

[Mudhammam]

The Turing test, no. Allow me to introduce the Dostoevsky test. When an entire dictionary is uploaded into a computer's language program, and pressed to take some time to express its "emotions" and "thoughts," if it can return with a work that approaches The Brothers Karamazov, perhaps writing notes about the process and how it came up with the ideas or subplots on the side, it will have sufficiently convinced me. Shit, I'd be happy if it produced something akin to Genesis 1 or even Dr. Seuss. Come to think of it, has anyone tried to write a book via a computer that formulates from its own software meaningful and/or artful syntax?

---

Well, this is interesting:
http://singularityhub.com/2014/11/09/com...read-them/

You presume you can pass the Dostoevsky test?

Perhaps the big gap is not between your mind and computer, but between your mind and your concept of Dostoevsky.

No, but I do presume I am able to engage in plenty of activities that eliminate doubt as to whether or not I am a person.  I don't even know what that last remark means.

[The Grand Nudger]

Are you trying to determine whether or not a computer is a person - or whether or not it has mind? Are all minds somehow required to be human minds? What if my comp mind laughed at your bioautomatonical "literature" foolishness?
(but, supposing a comp system did pass that test...does that make it a person, to you? Suppose a person could not provide all of that convincing "person stuff"...does that mean they do not have a mind...to you?)

[Mudhammam]

Are you trying to determine whether or not a computer is a person - or whether or not it has mind?

I think one is an indication of the other. The question was about giving a robot rights of personhood, was it not? Don't we typically measure this by the degree to which a being has an autonomous mind?

[Thumpalumpacus]

Will you keep adding modifiers if it turns out that machines can do these things - as you just did?  

As the conversation gets more specific, of course modifiers should be added.  It's sort of the nature of these things.

Disagree all you like, but I think that lying can be described a little more simply than the creation of some alternate reality Parker.  Like...claiming something you both know to be untrue..which is so blissfully easy to do in a machine setting it pains me to tell you that all that is required is the negation of a true statement, voila...a lie has been produced.  All of this is ignoring how uncreative our every day human lies are to begin with. :wink:

Do you have an instance of a computer telling a lie without having been instructed to do so? That is the creative act.

We build negation into the alu's that control every cpu of every device with a computer circuit. -All- computers are capable of lying, we simply program them to do other, more useful things. Find me a useful lie and I bet you'll find machines generating those as well. While I don't think that negation encapsulates every idea you and I may have attached with lying, it -completely describes- the operative effect of a lie- by everyday use of the simplest possible gate.

That's fair enough.  But again, the fact that they must be programmed to be creative is evidence that there is an inherent difference between men and computers.  The arts came about in men spontaneously, and in my opinion, they arose in order to express the ineffable. Programming a computer to compose a song or book according to provided parameters is not creativity in action. It is imparting formulae and harvesting the results of a mechanical process.
I don't know if computers will ever have a sense of self, or a sense of the ineffable; perhaps they will, perhaps they won't -- but I know that the OP's assertion that we're no different than computers is, today, not an accurate statement.

[The Grand Nudger]

@Nestor Which we assess by effect...and not every effect presented by every human mind will pass every test we use to ponder the same designation for a machine.  The effects aren't always all that similar either.  This is just between two humans presupposed to have mind.  

Personally, while being human is, to me, an indicator that something has mind...-not being human is no indicator that it doesn't.  Wouldn't you agree?  Or, are we humans the only creatures which possess mind, in your estimation?

@Parker I do agree that the OP's wording is unfortunate, but I wonder whether you and I are -as- different from computers of today as you seem to believe. -and yes, I have many instances of computers telling lies which they were not programmed to tell..we call them errors.......I'll send you (rather than windows) my next report dump, lol.
(You think you haven't been programmed - that you can point to this as a difference, willing to reconsider? Will all of your objections aim to simply assert computational minds out of existence?)

[Mudhammam]

Which we assess by effect...and not every effect presented by every human mind will pass every test we use to ponder the same designation for a machine.  The effects aren't always all that similar either.  This is just between two humans presupposed to have mind.  

Personally, while being human is, to me, an indicator that something has mind...-not being human is no indicator that it doesn't.  Wouldn't you agree?  Or, are we humans the only creatures which possess mind, in your estimation?

(You think you haven't been programmed - that you can point to this as a difference, willing to reconsider? Will all of your objections aim to simply assert computational minds out of existence?)

I do agree that the OP's wording is unfortunate, but I wonder whether you and are -as- different from computers of today as you seem to believe.

So what's the basis for differentiating between what is protected by law and what isn't? If a being has a certain type of mind AND sentience? (Of course other animals have minds and feel as well, and should probably have some degree of protection, but is a whale or a pig a "person"? Doubtful. Yet we would rightly grant this to a newborn... and not your laptop or roomba, right?)

As far as my objections, I'm just skeptical that we can define mind in computational terms and not lose an essential element of what it means to be mindful in the fullest sense.

[Exian]

I think the part where I'm having trouble connecting is to do with hardware and software, and their "organic" counterparts. Today, with whatever level of A.I. we have (I'm really lacking in knowledge on this topic, obviously lol), it seems the goal is to mimic some form of mind with programming, which would be the same as trying to create consciousness using thoughts, would it not?

[The Grand Nudger]

That would be an ancillary concern, with regards to determining what does or does not possess mind.  If want to have that discussion we'd have to have some way of lumping "mindful" things on one side and "mindless" things on another.  It's a good question.  I think that if we had other minds to consider we might even come up with better ideas about our -own- rights and legal protections.  
I would not, even presented with a machine mind, think that granting the machine mind all of the rights granted to human persons would be an immediate concern.  Why would I?  They aren't human beings (our rough current template for a "person") and so would not necessarily be concerned with , inconvenienced, or liberated by what concerns, inconveniences, or liberates us.  I think that some things would or could be shared, and in those instances a cse could be made...but, again, none of this helps us to determine what machines are or are not capable of (or even the nature of our own minds.)

As far as my objections, I'm just skeptical that we can define mind in computational terms and not lose an essential element of what it means to be human in the fullest sense.

Fixed that for you.........but...we're talking comp -mind-..not comp -human-. We can have that convo though...I'm pretty good at reducing human pretension while simultaneously being an exemplary expression -of it-...lol.

@ Ex. The attempts we make at AI are task oriented..they are designed to beat the test...and the test is, to some degree...a test of "humanity". So...that's what they mimic. Course...thats what we mimic too...so...idk.... There are folks trying to get away from this paradigm, of course.

[Mudhammam]

So, if we were able to reduce HUMAN minds, this combination of intellect and sensation, i.e. our personal experiences, to something like a vast network of computations and signals, does that force us to view our experiences---and by extension, of the entire world---as a sort of computer simulation?