Map of the Quest - Where we are going
Session III - Exploring Robotville
Session IV - Exploring Robotville II - Work and Robots and Rossum's Universal Robots Play - What if all work were eliminated by Robots or What would happen if Robots became Intelligent and Self-Aware?
Session V - Exploring WorldView Village - What matrices of Ideas Think it possible and What matrices think it impossible and Why? What is your worldview? See http://www.virtualworldfairs.org and the Palace of WorldViews there. C. S. Lewis wrote the Abolition of Man many years before modern computers but in this book he writes how some scientists and thinkers actually, by their way of thinking, abolish the human race itself. He makes a statement in this book What we call Man's power over Nature turns out to be a power exercised by some men over other men with Nature as its instrument. What happens when SOME men create machines that they claim are as conscious and self-aware as other men? What happens to the men who did not create these allegedly conscious machines compared to those claim they have created them?
Session VI - Exploring Cyborgvillage - Humans Becoming Part Machines? In your books RoboSapiens read the chapters that have to do with putting machines into humans or using A.I. devices in our bodies such as the 'intelligent' leg you see being worn or the 'intelligent' arm. Quest for other information about this merger of humans with robotic parts that have A.I. built into them. What is this like? Will the definition of human need to be changed if this is done or do persons with these A.I. parts become less than fully human? More? Or are they just humans with artificial parts? At one point would you cease to be a human being as your body parts are replaced by A.I. robotic parts or would you continue to remain a human being even if ALL of your body parts were replaced by machines or is that not possible (I don't mean technically not possible I mean not possible because you believe a human being does not consist only of his body parts).
Session VII - Exploring LawTown - The legal and political issues IF such a Robosapien would be created BUT also What if scientists claimed to have created a Robosapien (an intelligent conscious, self-aware machine) and they had it claim equal rights to humans yet actually they programmed it in such a way to make it appear to be conscious when it is not) - so what then would be the consequences for society if such a robot would be given equal rights but it is really not conscious or self-aware?
Session VIII - Reporting our Discoveries in the Village of Veritas - The Village of Truth and Reality - We answer the questions: What, So What and Now What about Robosapiens and their possible creation. Your reports will indicate what you have learned along the way about our own consciousness, who we are, what others think about who we are and how all of this impacts your decision as to which way to answer the question IS IT POSSIBLE and IF SO WHY SO and IF NOT WHY Not? Also what are the possible results of humans trying to create thinking machines?
The most amazing truth about our Quest is this: We can't all be right about this if we disagree! If we are unanimous in our conclusion then we could all be right or we could all be wrong. But if our Quest results in a split decision then some of us are right but not all of us could be.
Can human beings make a robosapien - a machine that can think, be self-aware and have consciousness? If some of us say no and some of us say yes, some of us are definitely wrong.
And remember this is NOT just a technical question. Some of us might think well it is possible science could advance in its knowledge so it CAN do it though it is unlikely. That is the technical answer to the question of whether we can make conscious machines that think and are as aware as we are of self. But there is another aspect of the answer that needs to be given and that is is it LOGICALLY and ONTOLOGICALLY possible to create a conscious, self-aware thinking machine? BY LOGICALLY I mean is the notion of a thinking, conscious self-aware machine an oxymoron - a logical impossibility because when a machine becomes a thinking, self-aware conscious thing it ceases to be a thing and becomes a being? ONTOLOGICALLY because a human being's consciousness is NOT located in his biology or physical being but in his immaterial aspect. If you believe you as a human being are ONLY atoms and molecules - matter that has electricity and chemistry but nothing else, then you will likely answer the question YES we can create thinking, self-aware and conscious machines/beings. If you think there is an immaterial aspect of a human being that humans can't observe with our scientific instruments but is the actual cause of consciousness and the source itself of human thinking and self-awareness and the brain is united with this immaterial soul or aspect, then science can't create something immaterial and so ontologically science is impotent with regard to making a machine conscious or self-aware and any such 'appearance' of consciousness or self-awareness would simply be just that 'an appearance' but not the reality itself.