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Article 7067 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: tobis@meteor.wisc.edu (Michael Tobis)
Subject: Re: Brain and Mind 
Message-ID: <1992Sep29.201938.27576@meteor.wisc.edu>
Organization: University of Wisconsin, Meteorology and Space Science
References: <1992Sep24.000850.6734@hilbert.cyprs.rain.com> <1992Sep28.164828.2122@meteor.wisc.edu> <1a8plqINN82t@gap.caltech.edu>
Date: Tue, 29 Sep 92 20:19:38 GMT
Lines: 24

In article <1a8plqINN82t@gap.caltech.edu> carl@SOL1.GPS.CALTECH.EDU writes:
>In article <1992Sep28.164828.2122@meteor.wisc.edu>, tobis@meteor.wisc.edu (Michael Tobis) writes:

>>Well, if you want to devote yourself to something that may turn out to
>>be futile, go ahead.

>Odd.  That's exactly what some people say about meteorology.

Heh. Given my experiences of the last few weeks, you have a point.

Still, we have energy conservation, mass conservation, angular
momentum conservation, entropy, radiation theory, chemistry, and a bunch
of other solid results I won't bore you with, and we do have a real
world that allows us to objectively evaluate our results. "Strong" AI 
has a _hunch_.

While it may be true that our field is reaching a point of diminishing returns
(the evidence is that it hasn't, and won't until computing power stops
increasing at the earliest), the comparison would still not be a good one.
As long as all the definitions of consciousness remain subjective, which
I think they will, and which, btw, the Turing test emphatically is, the
prospect of artificial consciousness isn't even a well-defined goal.

mt


