Category: Artificial Intelligence
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Robotic Gallbladder Removal
The shape of things to come. Will human surgeons be out of a job? "This advancement moves us from robots that can execute specific surgical tasks to robots that truly understand surgical procedures." Axel Krieger, Johns Hopkins medical roboticist. Truly understand?
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Why AI Systems Cannot be Conscious
1) To be able to maintain that AI systems are literally conscious in the way we are, conscious states must be multiply realizable. Consider a cognitive state such as knowing that 7 is a prime number. That state is realizable in the wetware of human brains. The question is whether the same type of state…
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Papyrology and AI: the Library at Herculaneum
How much of a curse and how much of a blessing Artificial Intelligence will prove to be remains to be seen. Book this on the blessing side of the ledger: The University of Kentucky (UKY) has announced it is a co-recipient of a $13.5 million (€11.5 million) grant from the European Research Council in support of an international effort…
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AI and the Shroud of Turin
Here. Linkage does not constitute endorsement. I haven't watched the video at the time of this posting.
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AI and Demons
You may remember our 'demonic' discussion from last summer. See Reading Now: Demonic Foes. The comment thread runs to 61 entries, some of them excellent. Bro Joe now wants us to read: Satanic AI: ChatGPT gives instructions. Another topic we ought to explore is the possibility of demonic possession of AI systems. According to Richard…
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What’s to Stop an AI System from having a Spiritual Soul?
John Doran in a comment presents an argument worth bringing to the top of the pile: A) Anything conscious has a non-material basis for such consciousness. B) Certain AI constructs [systems] are conscious. Therefore: C) Such AI constructs [systems] have a non-material component in which their consciousness resides. Why doesn't that work? It's obviously valid.…
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AI, Intellectual Theft, and Lawsuits
A year or two ago I was bumping along at about one thousand page views per diem when I experienced an unusual uptick in traffic. Inspection of the MavPhil traffic log suggested that my content was being stolen. But I didn't much care, and I still don't much care inasmuch as my content has very…
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AI and the Unity of Consciousness
Top AI researchers such as Geoffrey Hinton, the "Godfather of AI," hold that advanced AI systems are conscious. That is far from obvious, and may even be demonstrably false if we consider the phenomenon of the unity of consciousness. I will first explain the phenomenon in question, and then conclude that AI systems cannot accommodate…
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Can an AI System Meditate?
Resolute meditators on occasion experience a deep inner quiet. It is a definite state of consciousness. You will know it if you experience it, but destroy it if you try to analyze it. If you have the good fortune to be vouchsafed such a state of awareness you must humbly accept it and not reflect…
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Is A.I. Killing the World Wide Web?
From The Economist: As AI changes how people browse, it is altering the economic bargain at the heart of the internet. Human traffic has long been monetised using online advertising; now that traffic is drying up. Content producers are urgently trying to find new ways to make AI companies pay them for information. If they cannot, the open web…
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Intelligence, Cognition, Hallucination, and AI: Notes on Susskind
Herewith, a first batch of notes on Richard Susskind, How to Think About AI: A Guide for the Perplexed (Oxford 2025). I thank the multi-talented Brian Bosse for steering me toward this excellent book. Being a terminological stickler, I thought I'd begin this series of posts with some linguistic and conceptual questions. We need to…
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A Warning to ChatGPT Users
I am gearing up for a series of posts on A. I. The topic has grabbed me by my epistemic shorthairs. But for now, read this.
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Philosophy from the Twilight Zone: “The Lonely”
Substack latest. With a tip of the sweat-stained hat to Elliot Crozat and Brian Bosse for stimulating discussion.
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Grok on Brian Leiter
I put the question to the Grok bot: Who first called Brian Leiter 'Ladder Man' and why? Grok shot back: The earliest identified use of the nickname "Ladder Man" for Brian Leiter appears in a blog post by Bill Vallicella on Maverick Philosopher dated March 13, 2014. Vallicella used the term to criticize Leiter’s perceived…
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Artificial Intelligence and the Death of the University
The universities have been under assault from the Left for decades, but now advanced A. I. has its destructive role to play. A recent article by James D. Walsh in New York Magazine, widely circulated among academics, reported that “just two months after OpenAI launched ChatGPT [in 2022], a survey of 1,000 college students found that nearly 90…