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From: erich@eecs.cs.pdx.edu (Erich Boleyn)
Newsgroups: comp.ai
Subject: Re: What AI is exactly.
Message-ID: <47@pdxgate.UUCP>
Date: 7 Sep 90 06:28:28 GMT
References: <11770@accuvax.nwu.edu>
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lynch@aristotle.ils.nwu.edu (Richard Lynch) writes:


>I liked most of the comments of Philip Nettleton, BUT...

   I did too.

>Just how autonomous is a human?
>I mean, "No man is an island unto himself." (Dunne ?  I have no idea really.)
[extra deleted]

   I think by "autonomous" he meant that it must be able to decide things
for itself without having absolute overriding queries to a user or some
similar situation.  (i.e. you can't direct its actions by hard-wired
controls, it has to follow by choice, so to speak).

>Q:  Are ethics and/or morals a requirement of intelligence?

   Hmmm...  I don't think so, but I think that to exist efficiently in a
society, that is a requirement, otherwise there is no point of banding
together at all.  And we are very societal, so all of us use some kind of
moral system (referring to mammals, of course, the only examples of
intelligence we have).  If an intelligent being did not exist in contact
with other intelligent beings, would it need to have morals and/or ethics
at all?  We have them since it is a *survival* feature to develop them.

   Regards,
        Erich

   ___--Erich S. Boleyn--___  CSNET/INTERNET:  erich@cs.pdx.edu
  {Portland State University}     ARPANET:     erich%cs.pdx.edu@relay.cs.net
       "A year spent in           BITNET:      a0eb@psuorvm.bitnet
      artificial intelligence is enough to make one believe in God"