This question has pleagued me for ten weeks, and now I can finally answer it! All of the readings adressed this question, but I think I most agree with the ideas from Searl’s Minds, Brains and Programs. The most compelling part of his argument was the idea that so called “thinking machines” only “think” because a concious being has programmed it to act that way. My macbook recieves orders and carries them out in reply to each specific situation, giving the illusion of thought, but these actions were programmed into my computer by a human programmer. A computer is simply reproducing the thoughts of this programmer. My macbook is merely an interface between the user and this programmer.
Rachel Holm
