COGITO ERGO SOMETHING OR OTHER

Machine Thinks, Therefore It Is (Michelle Delio, Aug. 27, 2003, Wired News)

A new type of thinking machine that could completely change how people interact with computers is being developed at the Department of Energy's Sandia National Laboratories.

Over the past five years, a team led by Sandia cognitive psychologist Chris Forsythe has been working on creating intelligent machines: computers that can accurately infer intent, remember prior experiences with users, and allow users to call upon simulated experts to help them analyze problems and make decisions.

Forsythe's team was originally trying to create a "synthetic human" -- software capable of thinking like a person -- for use in national defense.

The thinking software was to create profiles of specific political leaders or entire populations. Once programmed, the synthetic human(s) could, along with analytic tools, predict potential responses to various hypothetical situations.

But along the way, the experiment took a different turn.

Forsythe needed help with the software, and asked some of the programmers in Sandia's robot lab for assistance. The robotics researchers immediately saw that the technology could be used to develop intelligent machines, and the research's focus quickly morphed from creating computerized people to creating computers that can help people by acting more like them.

Enlightenment Man in his desperation latched on to the absurdly inadequate assertion of Rene Descartes--"I think, therefore I am"--but as this story helpfully shows, thinking is rather a meager thing in the long run. Computers will sooner or later "think", but the fact that we'll be able to program them to accept any reality we choose suggests just how tenuous a basis that is upon which to base the claim that reason renders greater certitude than faith. Posted by Orrin Judd at August 29, 2003 6:17 PM