[ExI] Searle and AI

[Gordon Swobe]

--- On Sun, 12/27/09, Ben Zaiboc <bbenzai at yahoo.com> wrote:

> I was led to think that Searle
> believes that conscious AI is impossible (due to certain
> people saying things like "Strong AI of the sort that Searle
> refutes"), but in "Why I Am Not a Property Dualist", he
> says:
> 
> "Maybe someday we will be able to create conscious
> artifacts, in which case subjective states of consciousness
> will be ‘physical’ features of those artifacts"
> 
> and
> 
> "Consciousness is thus an ordinary feature of certain
> biological systems, in the same way that photosynthesis,
> digestion, and lactation are ordinary features of biological
> systems"
> 
> Thinking that we will maybe be able to create conscious
> artifacts someday is what I call affirmation of the idea,
> not refutation.
> 
> He even hints at how this might be possible, by comparing
> it to photosynthesis, which we are now very close to being
> able to reproduce in non-biological systems.

Searle believes we will never create strong AI on software/hardware systems, not that strong AI is impossible.

He believes you have strong AI, Ben, and he considers you a biological machine. We may someday create other strong AI machines a lot like you. But they won't run formal programs on hardware any more than you do (even if you think you do). 

-gts