According to the materials in class i would say that machines cannot think. Machines can be programmed to appear to be thinking, but do not have the capacity to freely think like humans. According to Searle, ” the appropriately programmed computer really is a mind,” ( Searle, 67). A computer has to be programmed to pick up knowledge where as a human can pick it up on its own through senses and perceptions. Computers cannot pick up material from outside their means like a human can and use it to create new knowledge. Humans are self programmable and computers need to have someone or something give them a program. Humans can pick up material in the same fashion as computer but a computer does not have the ability to pick up a material like a human. Dupin in The Murders In The Rue Morgue,can systematically put things together like a machine would but a machine could not pick up things like Dupin could. Machines are different and do not have the capacity to think.
–Courtney Acosta
