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From: jqb@netcom.com (Jim Balter)
Subject: Re: Putnam reviews Penrose.
Message-ID: <jqbDBq5B2.G4M@netcom.com>
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References: <3ss4sm$cjd@mp.cs.niu.edu> <jqbDBotnE.MGC@netcom.com> <3u5tf0$b6k@hamilton.maths.tcd.ie> <BILL.95Jul14081228@subiculum.nsma.arizona.edu>
Date: Fri, 14 Jul 1995 21:06:38 GMT
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Xref: glinda.oz.cs.cmu.edu sci.logic:12425 comp.ai.philosophy:30213

In article <BILL.95Jul14081228@subiculum.nsma.arizona.edu>,
Bill Skaggs <bill@nsma.arizona.edu> wrote:
>Jim Balter:
>   My cat can lick my chin but I cannot.  Does this prove that my cat 
>   is superior to me?  
>
>Timothy Murphy:
>   Nobody was talking about superiority.

Timothy's note hasn't reached here yet, so I will respond to it in this
context (sorry, Bill).

I will excise all the appropriate criticisms due here, and simply point out
that Timothy statement is factually incorrect, since I was responding to this
exact text:

	Let's now suppose that Penrose wants to prove himself superior to a
	robot ...


(I am not addressing whether Penrose does indeed want to do that,
so please no requests for page numbers.)

>   It does show that you are different to your cat,
>   which was the point at issue.

Perhaps you, should ask Calvin whether that was the question at issue
for him in the note to which I responded.

>As Ross Perot would say, that dog won't hunt.  If there were no
>question of superiority, nobody would give a damn.  It is indisputable
>that robots are different than humans, because they are robots, and it
>is indisputable that Jim is different from his cat.  The important
>question is whether humans are necessarily superior to robots, in any
>relevant way.


-- 
<J Q B>

