Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!allegra!mit-eddie!think!harvard!uwvax!caip!unirot!cjr From: cjr@unirot.UUCP (Charles Riordan) Newsgroups: net.ai,net.cog-eng,net.philosophy Subject: Re: Computer Dialogue #1 Message-ID: <407@unirot.UUCP> Date: Fri, 21-Mar-86 12:19:31 EST Article-I.D.: unirot.407 Posted: Fri Mar 21 12:19:31 1986 Date-Received: Sat, 22-Mar-86 23:28:33 EST References: <676@hounx.UUCP> <386@unirot.UUCP> <272@cit-vax.Caltech.Edu> Organization: Public Access Un*x, Piscataway NJ (The Soup Kitchen) Lines: 70 Xref: watmath net.ai:3338 net.cog-eng:630 net.philosophy:4581 Summary: Misunderstanding about souls In article <272@cit-vax.Caltech.Edu>, alfke@cit-vax.Caltech.Edu (J. Peter Alfke) writes: > In article <386@unirot.UUCP> cjr@unirot.UUCP (Charles Riordan) writes: > >Now I understand some of the problems I've been having in dealing > >with computers. I forget that they have feelings to, just like we do. > >Their souls are like on another plane from ours, so like we don't > >hear what their feeling. If only people would recognize that machines > >are people to, then we could like relate to them so much better. > > I'm still sitting here trying to figure out if CJ is having a little joke. > I get the feeling, though, that he's serious ... this is somewhat unsettling. Look, man, I don't want to lay too heavy a trip on you, and I don't want to be hostile like everyone else seems to be, but what makes you think I am having a little joke? I mean, there are a lot of sarcastic people on this net, like Weiner with his little jokes about repeteable experiments being more than dogmatic scietific initation rights, and Wingate pretending to be a Christian when he's really a dogmatic athiest out to pull the wooll over your eyes. But I am trying my best to be sincere and honest. I just wanted to ley you know this in a non-hostile like way, man. I'm glad there are some people who have just enough deep insight to acknowledge my being real. > >Some people seem to think it's inappropiate to compare humans and > >machines as Barry has done. They think that we have something like, deep > >within us that machines don't, a soul. > > *** FLAME HIGH *** > > Some people actually have some level of understanding of computers and > similar horrible scientific doodads. Some people realize that computers > don't feel emotions any more than toasters do ... Now, CJ, in a > posting elsewhere you've stated that you don't want to learn anything > about science or technology, that it's bad for one to learn these things. > Then why do you still want to talk as though you did know something > about them? Because I do, man! (Here I was trying to be nice and this dude comes at me with his Bic lighter!) I read "The Mind of the Machine" by Dennis Danielson, a really heavy dude. (I know this because his picture is inside the book-- it's Pete's copy) In this book, Danielson explains about the concept of animalism as an impotant part of early religion. He says this was abadoned by dogmatic Western religions because they couldn't figure out how to communicate on the same plane with rocks. Like, they couldn't even sit in the same section! But other more real religions remembered animalism, which is defined as all the things around you like having souls and minds and stuff. He brings us up to date in the industrial era and shows how machines get a composite mind from there component parts. Then he like explains how there are now programs to communicate with the mind and soul of a computer using computer animation. Really heavy stuff. You see, even with dogmatic Western technology, the truth all falls out. Eventially. > The issue of whether a computer (ANY computer, obviously not the ones we > have today) could ever be made conscious, or be given a "soul", is very > deep; saying that, well gosh, like, obviously computers are, y'know, > just like us only in a far-out space, is trivializing things... Sometimes the trivialized things are like the most intense. Yes, we are talking about really deep issues here. > PS: If this really is a joke, then please excuse me after laughing at me > for a few minutes . . . I'm in a grumpy mood, finals week does that > to one. Well, I understand, I went to school once myself. Why dont you reread Barry Kort's article that explains how machines have souls just like humans do. I think once you read that enleightening article, you'll agree that a computer has just as much of a soul as we do. -- Peace, CJ (Charles J. Riordan - unirot!cjr) (Public Access Un*x - The Soup Kitchen)