From newshub.ccs.yorku.ca!ists!helios.physics.utoronto.ca!news-server.ecf!utgpu!cs.utexas.edu!usc!rpi!psinntp!psinntp!scylla!daryl Thu Apr 16 11:34:37 EDT 1992
Article 5106 of comp.ai.philosophy:
Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy
Path: newshub.ccs.yorku.ca!ists!helios.physics.utoronto.ca!news-server.ecf!utgpu!cs.utexas.edu!usc!rpi!psinntp!psinntp!scylla!daryl
>From: daryl@oracorp.com (Daryl McCullough)
Subject: Re: SHRDLU's mind
Message-ID: <1992Apr13.151731.22702@oracorp.com>
Organization: ORA Corporation
Date: Mon, 13 Apr 1992 15:17:31 GMT
Lines: 19

christo@psych.toronto.edu (Christopher D. Green) writes:

> Surely whether SHRDLU, thermostats, and rocks have minds is an
> empirical question.

Surely not. It is a philosophical question, which is the reason that
we have this newsgroup. It isn't an empirical question because it
doesn't have any observable consequences.

We already know all the empirical facts there are to know about
SHRDLU, and we still do not agree on whether it has a mind. What sort
of empirical discovery do you think could ever be brought to bear on
that question? What would constitute empirical evidence that something
does or does not have a mind? Until we have an answer to that
question, the theory of mind is not an empirical theory.

Daryl McCullough
ORA Corp.
Ithaca, NY


