Granny Objections to Computers' Having Minds

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Granny Objections to Computers' Having Minds

• From Lady Lovelace to John Searle

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(1) Computers only do what they're programmed to
do (Lady Lovelace).

• (a) A program is just a set of mechanical rules
  many of our traits are programmed in that sense,
  e.g., the DNA code in our genes.
• (b) If a programmer writes a programme it doesn't
  mean he knew in advance everything that it
  would/could do A programmer could invent the DNA
  code.
• (c) Programmes can be self-modifying, just as we
  are.
• (d) Codes can be generated without a programmer
  (e.g., DNA).

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(2) Computers can't do anything new (Lady
Lovelace Variant).

• Yes they can, for example, because of chance
  effects from outside the computer (inputs), or
  from inside the computer, or pseudo-random
  effects produced by the code itself, or through
  effects of the code that the programmer did not
  expect, or through self-modification.

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(3) Computers can't be creative.

• Yes they can, see above and if you mean really
  creative, like Einstein, most of us can't either.

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(4) Computers can't make mistakes.

• Yes they can reply similar to reply about doing
  something new.

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(5) Computers are mechanical, we are flexible.

• Programmes can be extremely flexible, adapting to
  inputs, or to changes in their own code and if
  we adopt another scale, we're pretty mechanical
  -- predictable, repetitive, limited -- too.

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(6) People have real-time histories computers
only have a pseudo-past.

• If you were duplicated, molecule-for-molecule, at
  this moment, your double would not have a real
  history either so what? It doesn't matter
  whether the current state was reached through
  real time or otherwise If it's the right state,
  it's the right state.

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(7) Computers can't choose they can only do what
they are programmed todo.

• Same reply as earlier for freedom, flexibility,
  and error besides, it's not clear whether we can
  really choose either.

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(8) Computers don't/can't have feelings.

• Whether or not that's true is what this is all
  about it cannot simply be assumed to be true.

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(9) We're not mere machines.

• What's a machine? -- Till further notice, it is
  any system that operates according to the causal
  laws of physics. And what are we?

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(10) I don't want to know how a computer does it,
I want to know how I do it.

• Till further notice, the clearest theory of how
  anyone or anything does certain kinds of
  intelligent things is through computation. So
  until a better theory comes along, we have no
  basis for rejecting computation.
• There is a version of (10) that is not a
  granny-objection, and that is that computers can
  only do little BITS of what we can do. There are
  many ways to do the little bits, so there's no
  point taking them seriously. The answer to this
  is that it's correct, but if/when the models
  start scaling up toward human capacity (as the
  Turing Test, which we will discuss soon,
  dictates), this objection loses its force.

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(11) Computers are isolated from the world we
are not.

• Computers can be as interactive with the world as
  their input/output devices make them.