Re: Fwd: Implementation/Relativity

From: Hans Moravec <hpm.domain.name.hidden>
Date: Wed, 28 Jul 1999 22:45:19 -0400

Russell Standish <R.Standish.domain.name.hidden>:
> I don't think we ever discussed the concept of attributing
> consciousness to inanimate objects before Hans came along.

But I think you DID agree to attribute consciousness to
purely abstract entities, notably mathematically defined
universes containing SASes.

I merely pointed out that it is possible, even natural
and common, to map such abstractions containing
self-aware systems onto many things we commonly encounter.

This violates some reflexive assumptions you carry, many
instilled by a western education.
Those assumptions badly need to be violated.

They may have been good during our recent naive materialist
phase of development, but that phase is ending.
This list's discussion topic is one symptom of that end, as
are looming questions about conscious machines.

Other traditions have no problem seeing minds in
inanimate objects, when such interpretation facilitates
interaction. That acceptance has much to do with the
Japanese comfortable acceptance of robots.

Western stinginess in attributing minds, on the other
hand, is becoming a Luddite-rousing impediment to progress.
Received on Wed Jul 28 1999 - 19:50:12 PDT