{"id":14327,"date":"2026-08-03T10:56:57","date_gmt":"2026-08-03T17:56:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/?p=14327"},"modified":"2026-08-03T11:01:03","modified_gmt":"2026-08-03T18:01:03","slug":"a-trendy-example-of-an-alienans-adjective-artificial-in-artificial-intelligence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2026\/08\/03\/a-trendy-example-of-an-alienans-adjective-artificial-in-artificial-intelligence\/","title":{"rendered":"A Trendy Example of an Alienans Adjective: ‘Artificial’ in ‘Artificial Intelligence’"},"content":{"rendered":"

My examples scattered hitherto over many a post were stodgy such as ‘decoy’ in ‘decoy duck’ and faux<\/em> in ‘faux<\/em> marble.’\u00a0 A decoy duck is not<\/em> a duck.\u00a0 Faux<\/em> marble is not<\/em> marble. An aktuell<\/a> example is ‘artificial’ in ‘artificial intelligence.’\u00a0 Artificial intelligence is not intelligence any more than artificial leather is leather.\u00a0 Just as there are not two kinds of leather, artificial and real, there are not two kinds of intelligence, artificial and real.\u00a0 Artificial leather simulates<\/em> (real) leather;\u00a0 artificial intelligence\u00a0 simulates (real) intelligence.\u00a0 Those are bare assertions.\u00a0 I link to an argument of mine at the end of this post. This just over the transom from Tony Flood:<\/p>\n

\n

Philosophically trained, this Substacker<\/a> asks the right questions re:\u00a0 “AI without minds.” Doubting, as a good Lonerganian should, that AI is at all a species of intelligence<\/i>, I’ve nevertheless been socially inhibited about using locutions like “so-called AI.” But no more. A baby brain is not an incipient computer, and computers neither are nor have minds. That insight might resonate with you as it does with me. She’s my “go-to” on this topic.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Yes, Tony, your Lonerganian point resonates with me although I put it in a different way above using ‘alienans<\/em> adjective,’ a term\u00a0 I picked up from Peter Geach, no slouch of a philosopher.\u00a0 From whom did he get it? No idea.\u00a0 Probably from some medieval dude.<\/p>\n

I explore the topic further and give more examples in Fiction and Alienans Adjectives.<\/a><\/p>\n

As for the substantive question whether AI systems are conscious, I argue for a negative answer in my Substack<\/em> article Artificial Intelligence and the Unity of Consciousness.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

My examples scattered hitherto over many a post were stodgy such as ‘decoy’ in ‘decoy duck’ and faux in ‘faux marble.’\u00a0 A decoy duck is not a duck.\u00a0 Faux marble is not marble. An aktuell example is ‘artificial’ in ‘artificial intelligence.’\u00a0 Artificial intelligence is not intelligence any more than artificial leather is leather.\u00a0 Just as … Continue reading “A Trendy Example of an Alienans Adjective: ‘Artificial’ in ‘Artificial Intelligence’”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[542,33,408,54],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14327","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-adjectives","category-artificial-intelligence","category-language-philosophy-of","category-mind"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14327","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14327"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14327\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14330,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14327\/revisions\/14330"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14327"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14327"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14327"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}