[Tormod]

Originally posted by: nemo
According to Science, we are born helpless (snip)

Huh? According to nature, I'd say. Or are you talking about some specific thing? Science (as you well know) is many things, LEAST of all a force which directs how nature behaves.

[Freethinker]

Originally posted by: nemo
According to Science, we are born helpless and require a great many people's assistance to meet Maslow's hierarchy of needs.

Born DEPENDANT perhaps. But not HELPLESS. At birth we can breath for oourselves, our hearts pump blood to all parts of our body. We can take nourishment given to us (the "dependant" side) withoout instruction or coaxing. The suckle instinct is hardwired. As is pattern recognition to recognize basic shapes as potential friend/ foe. (we "recognize" human type facial features).

The only self-sustaining entity science has envisioned is the myth of perpetual motion.

"energy can not be created nor destroyed"

This is not meant as validation of "perpetual motion". But to show that Science considers energy to be self-sustaining.

Nice verse – it's one of the most popular. Personally, I prefer 1 Timothy 1:15.

Thanks for helping to prove why Christianity is BAD for society. Why it fosters a negative attitude within it's followers. That was my claim and you helped prove it.

You are still coding logic and decision making processes that would be static as a replacement for spontaneous emotion.

Please explain how you are differentiating them. Examples might help.

Out of curiosity, would the introduction of emotion into software be synonymous with free will?

Free Will? Now we have a problem! First we have to find an agreeable defintion of Free Will. If we wee to (for some absurd reason, lol) allow for the existence of the Christian god, there would not be Free Will. Omniscience and Free Will are mutually exclusive. Even without, proving Free Will is ...

Would it ever be possible for a software application or robot to do something without a decision making process involved?

Man, you don't give any easy ones. Do ants follow a "decision making process"?

How would you go about coding something as abstract as a sense of humor?

You don't get any easier as you go along do you? Humor is societally relevant. What's funny in one place dies in another. However it would seem feasible to code particular filters to emulate specific humor parameters.

[nemo]

Maslow


Agreed. Dependancy is definitely a better fit than helplessness, and science doesn't direct nature. Out of curiosity, what topic would Maslow's work fit into?


Energy


Hadn't considered that. Thanks.


Christianity


I think we're addressing this topic pretty well over in Phil/Rel.


Spontaneous Emotion, Free Will and a Sense of Humor


I tried to answer these topics separately, but was getting redundant in my answers. My wife has this crazy idea that sometimes I just get up on the wrong side of the bed. Could a robot begin a process without a specific stimulus or intended result - or would every action be the result to some stimulus (allowing for the circumstance that no stimulus might be considered stimulus in and of itself)? Would robots ever be capable of having an argument about philosophy? Honestly, I'm having a hard time quantifying this subject myself; I keep having flashbacks to the movie "Short Circuit". I apologize for being vague and attempting to answer a question with more questions.


Ants


Their habit of forming single-file lines from their holes to their destination instead of wandering randomly about in search of food or whatever they are searching for would lend itself to a decision-making process for determining the validity of one ant's discovery of the location of food.


Humor


A guy walks up to me and says "Hey good-looking, I'm Steve".

I say "223, 27 and 0"

"What?"

"After 223 years of study, astronomy tells us that there are 27 heavenly bodies that should be orbiting Uranus, and none of them are named Steve."

--Does a computer 'get it', or am I simply stating a fact?

[Freethinker]

Originally posted by: nemo
Maslow
Out of curiosity, what topic would Maslow's work fit into?

In itself, Philosophy, as input, any discussion I would think.

Spontaneous Emotion, Free Will and a Sense of Humor

Could a robot begin a process without a specific stimulus or intended result

Could a human?

or would every action be the result to some stimulus

I think we have to assume that every action since the BB is the result of a combination of various causalities. I keep seeing the approach of requiring a greater level of self "activation" demanded for AI than for humans.

I apologize for being vague and attempting to answer a question with more questions.

Actually I find this a better approach to discussions. No one ever has absolute knowlege. (Though I come closest!) Exploring alternatives seems the most viable approach.