Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!husc6!bloom-beacon!mit-eddie!bbn!gatech!linus!mbunix!bwk
From: bwk@mitre-bedford.ARPA (Barry W. Kort)
Newsgroups: comp.ai
Subject: Re: Free Will & Self-Awareness
Summary: Does a dog have a Buddha nature?
Message-ID: <32611@linus.UUCP>
Date: 23 May 88 14:47:46 GMT
References: <4134@super.upenn.edu> <3200014@uiucdcsm> <1484@pt.cs.cmu.edu> <31738@linus.UUCP> <174@jackson.UUCP>
Sender: news@linus.UUCP
Reply-To: bwk@mbunix (Barry Kort)
Organization: Neurotic Netware, Dendrite Faults, NV
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Ewan Grantham has insightfully noted that our draft "laws of robotics"
begs the question, "How does one recognize a fellow sentient being?"

At a minimun, a sentient being is one who is able to sense it's environment,
construct internal maps or models of that environment, use those maps
to navigate, and embark on a journey of exploration.  By that definition,
a dog is sentient.  So the robot has no business killing a barking dog.
Anyway, the barking dog is no threat to the robot.  A washing machine
isn't scared of a barking dog.  So why should a robot fear one?

--Barry Kort