Its easily conceivable now that one can create a machine that impersonates a human and emotions, and then that machine would be coded to write a sonnet or concerto.
But, although it will give the impression (illusion) of feeling, it will still be running its code. Humans will have coded a fantastic illusionist, with no more emotional ability than any other tool, eg a hammer.
> According to the most extreme form of this view the only way by which one could be sure that a machine thinks is to be the machine and to feel oneself thinking.
This is true - one can only verify subjectivity in oneself. One might assume another living being does feel - but, we could be wrong - eg psychopathy can mean that others are unaware of a psychopath's "feelings" or lack of.
It does seem to me, that if we were able to code an ai that gives the impression of feelings, composes concertos apparently independently, etc, that ai would have to be a sort of psychopath.
Without getting too lost in spiritual BS, I think we are more than mere matter - the value in our experiences come from our emotions and feelings - not mere inputs that we label as 'emotions' and 'feelings' as would be the case for an ai. But emotions etc are subjective states, not objectively verifiable (even if we can see something correlating on a chart).
Put simply, ai can never have a 'soul' even if it presents a wonderful appearance of kindliness, emotionality or whatever. Perhaps there will be no test in the world that will be able to find this out. But it still won't have feelings, it can only ever be a automaton.
But, although it will give the impression (illusion) of feeling, it will still be running its code. Humans will have coded a fantastic illusionist, with no more emotional ability than any other tool, eg a hammer.
> According to the most extreme form of this view the only way by which one could be sure that a machine thinks is to be the machine and to feel oneself thinking.
This is true - one can only verify subjectivity in oneself. One might assume another living being does feel - but, we could be wrong - eg psychopathy can mean that others are unaware of a psychopath's "feelings" or lack of.
It does seem to me, that if we were able to code an ai that gives the impression of feelings, composes concertos apparently independently, etc, that ai would have to be a sort of psychopath.
Without getting too lost in spiritual BS, I think we are more than mere matter - the value in our experiences come from our emotions and feelings - not mere inputs that we label as 'emotions' and 'feelings' as would be the case for an ai. But emotions etc are subjective states, not objectively verifiable (even if we can see something correlating on a chart).
Put simply, ai can never have a 'soul' even if it presents a wonderful appearance of kindliness, emotionality or whatever. Perhaps there will be no test in the world that will be able to find this out. But it still won't have feelings, it can only ever be a automaton.