Should I Have The Right To Destroy What I Create?

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Sparkythedog said:
What do you mean? I still don’t understand what a soul or spirit is or what It’s function is.

How can you tell if something has a soul/spirit?

How do we know people have souls and not conscious machines?
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We know conscious machines dont have spirits because they are not living beings.

I suppose the function of a spirit is to dwell in the presence of God. Or at least thats why they were created.
 
Relevant to this thread,

Prior to the 1800s people used to round up cats and put them in barrels, wicker cages, or other containers and set them on fire. This was done as a form of entertainment. It was argued by people such as René Descartes that animals lack consciousness and don’t feel pain. That they were some form of biological automata. Descartes held that only humans are conscious, have minds and souls and thus were the only beings deserving of compassion.
 
Except a cat is a living thing and it can be demonstrated that they do, in fact, feel pain. Not only that, but the issue of morality isnt contingent upon feeling pain, its contingent upon life itself.The same cannot be said of a piece of machinery, it isnt alive. Not a good analogy.
 
Thorns said:
Except a cat is a living thing and it can be demonstrated that they do, in fact, feel pain. Not only that, but the issue of morality isnt contingent upon feeling pain, its contingent upon life itself.
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Well, if it’s decided that the machine in question in the scenario for this thread is neither alive nor can it feel pain (neither physical nor emotional) then it sounds like it’s not an object of moral concern. By all means feel free to disassemble and re-purpose its parts.
 
Sparkythedog said:
I find myself here. :confused: In California, I guess. Not sure where you’re going with that one.

The other things you listed are concepts. They are terms for how you brain interprets the world around you.
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Are you a mindless body? 🙂

Why do you refer to the brain as if it belongs to** you**? What precisely are “you” :confused:
 
tonyrey said:
Are you a mindless body? 🙂

Why do you refer to the brain between"ussbelongs to** you**? What precisely are “you” :confused:
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You are “your” brain. Damage to the brain can cause signigicant changes to a person’s personality.

The fact that our language has a dualistic approach in discussing the relationship between “us” and “our brain” is not an argument for a soul.

If we are not our brain, what is the function of the brain? And how does the soul interact with the body? I have yet to hear a coherent explanation.
 
Thorns said:
You find spirits in the spiritual world, but you also see them on earth in the form of human beings. Human beings are embodied spirits.
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when I look at human beings all I see is material. Where is the spirit? How does it interact with the body?how do you know there is a spiritual world? Do you have evidence for any of this?
 
Thorns said:
Except a cat is a living thing and it can be demonstrated that they do, in fact, feel pain. Not only that, but the issue of morality isnt contingent upon feeling pain, its contingent upon life itself.The same cannot be said of a piece of machinery, it isnt alive. Not a good analogy.
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What is the definition of a living thing? What makes a cat alive and a thinking and feeling machine not?
 
Thorns said:
Except a cat is a living thing and it can be demonstrated that they do, in fact, feel pain. Not only that, but the issue of morality isnt contingent upon feeling pain, its contingent upon life itself.The same cannot be said of a piece of machinery, it isnt alive. Not a good analogy.
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Sparky -
If, and only if YOU actually created/made the cat - the material, laws/evolution and everything - then, much as God has, you would have the full right to decease YOUR property.
 
Sparkythedog said:
Why?
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Because everything then would be OF and by YOU and you only. ‘Your’ machine is not life, so for that you can totally make up your own rules - so long as they do not impinge negatively on other folks, and indeed your self.
 
tonyrey said:
There is no such thing as “a thinking and feeling machine” except in one’s imagination.
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Tony,

Before you respond further, please go back and read the premise for this thread. This is a thought experiment where I’ve created a thinking machine.
 
Mount_Carmel said:
Because everything then would be OF and by YOU and you only. ‘Your’ machine is not life, so for that you can totally make up your own rules - so long as they do not impinge negatively on other folks, and indeed your self.
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As I asked another poster on this thread - Why is my machine not life? What is the difference between a thinking and feeling machine and a thinking feeling human?

Some have said it is the soul that separates them. But when I ask what or where a soul is or how to detect one, I don’t really get a cogent answer.
 
Sparkythedog said:
Tony,

Before you respond further, please go back and read the premise for this thread. This is a thought experiment where I’ve created a thinking machine.
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You need to justify the assumption that a machine could be capable of thought. How could it have insight, for example?
 
tonyrey said:
You need to justify the assumption that a machine could be capable of thought. How could it have insight, for example?
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The test that I proposed earlier, to tell if a computer has thought, is known as the Turing Test. In this test a person (you, me or anyone else) is either speaking with a human or a computer over an internet chat. The chat is anonymous so you don’t know whether you’re talking with the computer or the human. Your task, in this test is to determine if you are talking to the computer or the human. You can have any type of conversation you wish.

If the computer cannot be identified, meaning its responses are indistinguishable from a human’s responses, then the computer has passed the test. The test does not prove to us that the computer has “thoughts” like we do, but since its responses are the same as a human’s responses we can assume that it is doing the same thing that the rest of us do when we “think”.
 
Sparkythedog said:
The test that I proposed earlier, to tell if a computer has thought, is known as the Turing Test. In this test a person (you, me or anyone else) is either speaking with a human or a computer over an internet chat. The chat is anonymous so you don’t know whether you’re talking with the computer or the human. Your task, in this test is to determine if you are talking to the computer or the human. You can have any type of conversation you wish.

If the computer cannot be identified, meaning its responses are indistinguishable from a human’s responses, then the computer has passed the test. The test does not prove to us that the computer has “thoughts” like we do, but since its responses are the same as a human’s responses we can assume that it is doing the same thing that the rest of us do when we “think”.
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Can we assume or infer that? Is it not possible, even if not very likely, that the cognitive processes may be different and still arrive at the same responses? Even among humans, one may observe similar end-products arrived at by means of different cognitive processes as in problem-solving and decision-making.
 
This thread began with what had the potential to be a wondrously thought provoking discussion about the moral and ethical implications of creating a conscious entity. It wasn’t meant to be a discussion about whether or not we can, it was meant to be an examination of the responsibilities inherent in having done so. It was a question as to whether the rights of the creator can at some point become secondary to the rights of the creation. Is life, and consciousness in particular, so precious as to supersede the rights of the creator? And are the obligations of the creator such that he should feel some moral responsibility for the well-being of that which he has created?

But alas, it seems that such a discussion will not take place, and that is a shame. Men miss so much, by not being willing to listen, and even more-so, to question.
 
Sparkythedog said:
This is a thought experiment. In this scenario I created a conscious machine. God did not create it for me. My wuestion is, should I be allowed to destroy it on a

As long as you are not creatng a human, machine, yes you can destroy it.
Whst a strange question. What an umagination you have.
are you a scientist?
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meltzerboy said:
Can we assume or infer that? Is it not possible, even if not very likely, that the cognitive processes may be different and still arrive at the same responses? Even among humans, one may observe similar end-products arrived at by means of different cognitive processes as in problem-solving and decision-making.
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That is true. But until we can “see” a thought process “under the microscope” this is the best we can do. How would you decide whether something is a concious?
 
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