Protean Self-Transformation

John K Clark (johnkc@well.com)
Mon, 31 Mar 1997 21:28:07 -0800 (PST)


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On Mon, 31 Mar 1997 Gregory Houston <vertigo@triberian.com> Wrote:

>The physicality of the artificial heart is not artificial. You have
>replaced a physical thing with a physical thing. What we are
>debating is the ability to replace physically felt emotions with
>something not physical, something purely abstract.

If I hit my finger with a hammer that is an objective fact and my smashed
finger is a physical object, but the pain I experience is subjective, it is
not physical it's mental, and there is no way I can prove to anybody else
that it even exists. Nobody will ever be able to prove that a computer feels
emotions, but nobody will ever be able to prove that I do either.

>No one has shown me any evidence that a computer has the ability to
>feel emotive sensation

As I said I can't prove it, but it sure seems like a very good bet to me.
A computer works by manipulating electrons in a dry semiconductor substrate.
A brain works by manipulating ions in a wet protein substrate.
I can think of no unique property of ions that grants them and only them the
ability to generate emotions.

John K Clark johnkc@well.com

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