Are people morally evil?

[Alasdair]

The only difference between us and 'machines' is relative complexity, which in effect, means that we really are machines. Complex biological machines perhaps, but machines nonetheless. Take a bacteria for example, what separates it from a human except complexity? Nothing (if you believe in evolution, this is obvious). You could make a computer model the functioning of a bacteria couldn't you? Therefore you could model an entire human (or just the interesting bit, the brain). Currently scientists have been able to model an entire neurocortical column, which is kinda like the basic 'unit' of the brain. A few million of those and you have a fully functional human brain, except it's a machine... isn't it?

Originally posted by DarkAsmodeous
That's a silly statement, what machine can be said to have a purpose without a human compoent? Without a user or beneficiary, what would purpose even mean?

That's a very anthropocentric worldview, I suppose that worldview is a limitation of being human, and seeing the world through human terms. But it's probably fallacious, the universe clearly doesn't exist for us, and it will continue to exist long after we go extinct. It doesn't need to have a purpose, it just is. Purpose is an entirely human concept. Machines only exist to serve us because that's the purpose we ascribe to them, not because it's a universal truth.

[DarkAsmodeous]

The scientific materialist incompatibalist theory of conciousness, mental activity, and free will, is only a theory, and one with surprisingly little evidence relative to its popularity and the dogmatic way its adherents assert its truth. The issue of choice and conciousness, what makes man what he is, is an ancient question with thousands of years of valuable dialogue and pursuit that you have written away without cause. Also, the idea that we can construct a concious entity does nothing to refute the existance of conciousness or will until you manage to represent the process of valuation in purely mechanistic predictible terms. You can call us a machine all you like, but the stimuli to which we react is only stimuli once we attatch value, such as a thing being offered for sale or the prospect of life as a novelist, and its concievable that such a process could be entirely biological and mechanistic, yet personal experience with perception, as well the implications of such an assertion, lead me to question it. I'm always open to the possibility, but the dialogue isn't as settled as vocal materialists would have you believe.

Also, you say in your ast paragraph that purpose is a human concept, that's all I was asserting.

[Alasdair]

Originally posted by DarkAsmodeous
The scientific materialist incompatibalist theory of conciousness, mental activity, and free will, is only a theory, and one with surprisingly little evidence relative to its popularity and the dogmatic way its adherents assert its truth.

You could throw out the 'materialist incompatibalist' philosophical bit and just say 'the scientific theory of consciousness'. Not that there aren't competing sub-theories within cognitive neuroscience, but the scientific theories have the monopoly on all the evidence. No non-scientific theories have any evidence. Seriously, surprisingly little evidence you say? It is patently obvious that consciousness is bound to the physical brain, you just have to look at suffers of brain damage to see that this has to be the case. The concept of a 'soul' or other such mystical nonsense is clearly incompatible with such obvious observations, damage the physical structure of someones brain and you can damage their consciousness, their emotions, desires, goals etc - everything we associate with being human.

Originally posted by DarkAsmodeous
The issue of choice and conciousness, what makes man what he is, is an ancient question with thousands of years of valuable dialogue and pursuit that you have written away without cause.

Argumentum ad antiquitatem - just because it's old doesn't make it right, many (most) of the ancient philosophers were pretty much wrong about everything. Not that I'm saying they weren't geniuses, but they were often wrong. The ancients had no real understanding of the human body, and there understanding of the universe was mostly based on philosophical conjecture rather than any evidence. Neuroscience has demonstrably proved many ancient ideas on consciousness wrong, so we can easily write them away.

Originally posted by DarkAsmodeous
Also, the idea that we can construct a conscious entity does nothing to refute the existance of conciousness

Of course it wouldn't; how would constructing a conscious entity refute consciousness? It would just prove that consciouses and cognition is entirely grounded in the physical world.

"The question of whether a computer can think is no more interesting than the question of whether a submarine can swim" - Edsger Dijkstra

Originally posted by DarkAsmodeous
...or will until you manage to represent the process of valuation in purely mechanistic predictible terms. You can call us a machine all you like, but the stimuli to which we react is only stimuli once we attatch value

If a stimuli has no 'value' then we do not act on it; how we value/weight it is itself determined by other stimuli.

[Ja-Kha'jay]

animals still act on negative stimuli, by either choosing to ignore it, or by backing away, like yanking your hand out of a flame. this is an unconscious decision, for if it were a conscious one, you could have barbequed hand for dinner, which is not good for the body, so it removes the choice between pulling your hand out of leaving it in.

[DarkAsmodeous]

I never posited the existance of the solo, merely contested the idea that decisions are the product of a mechanistic domino effect, I didn't say a non-scientific theory, I said a non scientific materialist incompatibalist theory for a reason, its more specfic. I don't believe in a soul, soul's imply judgement or immortality, neither of which I believe in, there is an obvious link between conciousness and physical state, you really misinterperate me, my only point is that conciousness may very well be a state, and not an illusion of mechanistic principles.

[A_flyboy]

I find it funny that I showed hopes that AI may reach our level eventually and all of the sudden a bunch of people are trying to go the other way.

Actually, one of the closest things to a self aware computer right now, is in front of you as you read this. The TCP/IP protocol is self repairing and adaptive... imagine, the first man-made artaficial concious being... made from the internet... :O That is one disturbing pile of memories to have, considering what is on the internet (not just porn, also government sites/servers/data)