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Shadows of the Mind, by Roger Penrose
- Abstract
Roger Penrose, the distinguished mathematical physicist, has again entered the lists to rid the world of a terrible dragon. The name of this dragon is “strong artificial intelligence.”
Strong AI, as its defenders call it, is both a widely held scientific thesis and an ongoing technological program. The thesis holds that the human mind is nothing but a fancy calculating machine—“a computer made of meat”—and that all thinking is merely computation; the program is to build faster and more powerful computers that will eventually be able to do everything the human mind can do and more. Penrose believes that the thesis is false and the program unrealizable, and he is confident that he can prove these assertions.
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