Raphael Mezrahi - Linda de suza

Why is the idea of a thinking machine so compelling?

Minsky: I think there is a worldwide survival problem. As the population grows and people live longer, there won't be anybody to do the work. So there is an urgent need to make inexpensive mechanical people that are able to do all the things that moderately unskilled people do now.

Dennett: I don't find that very convincing, Marvin. I think we're interested in it for purely curious, scientific reasons. We want to know how we work.

Minsky: Or make machines that work better than us and can solve all the problems we wanted to but couldn't. As Hans Moravec used to say, "The machines will be us."

Dennett: Marvin, I have a slogan for you that came to mind while I was reading your book. I've used it myself as a paper title. "My body has a mind of its own, so what does it need me for?"

Minsky: [Laughs.] I once peeled a label off a London bus. It read: MIND YOUR HEAD.

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http://meaningoflife.tv/

Tem coisas muito variadas, com gente de diferentes proveniências: tem por exemplo, entrevistas com o Dennett, Pinker, Fukuyama e o Freeman Dyson. Vale a pena dar uma vista de olhos nesta última só para contemplar o verdadeiro Mr. Spock

Who Wants to Be A Millionaire?

Boston University's doctoral program in cognitive neuroscience prepares students for a career in brain modeling, robot design, or biomedical engineering—or for winning cash on the television quiz show Who Wants to Be A Millionaire?. Researchers in my department, Cognitive and Neural Systems (CNS), seek to understand the brain's mechanisms, including three cognitive systems that happen to be essential for a profitable performance on Millionaire: learning, memory, and decision-making. This summer—the start of my final year in the CNS Ph.D. program—I decided to apply my graduate skills to a decidedly practical purpose and auditioned for a turn in the show's perilous hot seat. (+)

Seed Salon: Robert Trivers and Noam Chomsky

“The only Zen you find on the tops of mountains is the Zen you bring up there.”

Another State Of Mind / Joel Tudor