Are We Just Really Smart Robots?Kenneth Silber ("Are We Just Really Smart Robots?," April) is worried about the encroaching scientific understanding of our brains and behavior. If science shows us to be simply smart biological machines, he believes this undermines liberal democracy, human rights, moral responsibility, and self-worth; all is permitted and authoritarian regimes will flourish. Fortunately, he argues, John Searle John Rogers Searle (born July 31 1932 in Denver, Colorado) is the Slusser Professor of Philosophy at the University of California, Berkeley. He is widely noted for contributions to the philosophy of language and the philosophy of mind, and also for his account of social reality. (in Mind: A Brief Introduction) and Jeff Hawkins Jeff Hawkins (born June 1, 1957 in Huntington, New York) is the founder of Palm Computing (where he invented the Palm Pilot)[1] and Handspring (where he invented the Treo). (in On Intelligence) have shown the mechanistic mech·a·nis·tic adj. 1. Mechanically determined. 2. Of or relating to the philosophy of mechanism, especially one that tends to explain phenomena only by reference to physical or biological causes. thesis is false, so we needn't worry. Human beings, although part of nature, nevertheless have a special something that grounds our dignity and value. The difficulty is that Silber doesn't quite specify what this special something might be. Is it consciousness? Nothing in Searle's biological naturalism Biological naturalism is a monist theory about the relationship between mind and body (i.e. brain), and hence an approach to the mind-body problem. It was first proposed by the philosopher John Searle in 1980 and is defined by two main theses: 1) all mental phenomena from pains, or in Hawkins' account of intelligence requires that our capacity for consciousness couldn't be computable and thus a property of a machine, once we understand the functions of the neural processes subserving consciousness. Could it be free will? But even Searle admits that the experience of free will might be an illusion, perhaps an adaptive illusion at that (although it's more likely the result of not being able to see the causal workings of our own brains). Could it be personhood per·son·hood n. The state or condition of being a person, especially having those qualities that confer distinct individuality: "finding her own personhood as a campus activist" ? Personhood rests on physically instantiated capacities for sentience sen·tience n. 1. The quality or state of being sentient; consciousness. 2. Feeling as distinguished from perception or thought. Noun 1. and self-concern. Complex though these are, there's no reason in principle why intelligent machines might not someday have moral claims on us, were they given such capacities. Although he doesn't establish the existence of a special human something--a soul, perhaps?--Silber needn't worry that the mechanistic thesis poses a threat. Even if it turns out that we're amazingly complex biological machines, we nevertheless remain persons, and our desire to be treated as ends in ourselves won't diminish. After all, that's "hard-wired" into the very neural architecture of our brains, as are the rest of our basic motives and desires. We'd still love and protect our families, fear death, abhor tyranny, and enjoy a good meal. Life would go on, minus the belief in the soul. So we can relax: There's no moral or political threat stemming from science, should it unmask us as "mere" machines. Even if we are, we'll continue to defend our freedoms with all the resources nature has given us. Thomas W. Clark, Director Center for Naturalism naturalism, in art naturalism, in art, a tendency toward strict adherence to the physical appearance of nature and rejection of ideal forms. Artists as diverse as Velázquez, J. F. Millet, and Monet, have followed naturalistic principles. Sommerville, MA |
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