Poll: Do Robots Have Souls?

[Lyx]

ETA: A brief scan of posts above this says "soul" might need a definition.

Whether or not it exists, we as humans have a clear idea of a thing that is "me" that can be taken out of the body and put somewhere apart from the body (e.g., in another body) without losing any of the "me"-ness. Without this idea, stories such as the body-swapping in Stargate SG-1 would make no sense.

The soul concept is also that part that remains "me" even though time, disease (Alzheimer's), or injury (see Phineas Gage) may mess with my memory and personality to such an extent that people say I'm "a whole nother person" or not really myself.

Are you aware that by this definition - Personality == Soul, soul requires none/little awareness?

(Hint: If you were to with "me" ACTUALLY mean "me", rather than personality, then it MAY work - but then your soul-swapping movies wouldn't work anymore

 

[k-ossuburb]

Well, no. But neither do humans so what's the problem?

This.

/thread.

 

[minus_273c]

They do not.

Yet.

It's a bit like the Asimov answer to the "When do robots deserve emancipation" question?. ?When they independently want it?. Q and A freely miss-quoted.

CJ

 

[Flatfrog]

I'm not trawling through 9 pages of replies, so I'm just going to weigh in and assume everything I say has already been said!

The poll as given doesn't have the answer I would give: No, of course they don't, but by any definition of the word 'soul' that makes any sense to me, given that *we* have souls, and we are essentially fleshy robots, a sufficiently powerful robot could have as much of a soul as we have.

For me, 'soul' is just another word for consciousness + free will + emotion + moral responsibility, and all of these things are perfectly possible in a robot. C3PO, if it existed, would have what I would call a soul (it's harder to tell with R2D2).

For more, read anything by Douglas Hofstadter, Daniel Dennett or Steven Pinker.

 

[llew]

Well, no. But neither do humans so what's the problem?

This.

There's no such thing as a soul, so no.

Prove it.

prove there is a soul
OT: its a chunk of metal with electric running through it so no, it has no soul

 

[Fetzenfisch]

the only possibility here would be an encephalorobotowitsch. Which is not really a robot again. so no. its against the principle of what is called a soul.

 

[Flatfrog]

OT: its a chunk of metal with electric running through it so no, it has no soul

And I'm a chunk of meat with electric running through me - what's your point?

 

[ethaninja]

Nothing does so.... yeah.

 

[Kaltazraza]

They have none, I ate them all.

 

[Flatfrog]

I THINK that the idea of a soul is utter bullshit.

There's a lot of possible meanings of the word. Let's try some:

- Immaterial essence that has some independent existence to our bodies and that survives our death
- Our free will, the aspect of us that has responsibility for our actions and which deserves to be punished or rewarded for them
- Our conscious self, the part that feels our pains and thinks our thoughts
- Our personal identity, what makes me me and you you.

I've arranged these in a rough order: there's overlap between them and I think it's a lot easier to deny the existence of the first than the last. But even as a committed mechanist and atheist, I think it's possible to defend all of them to some extent, even the first: if you think of a person as software rather than hardware, then there's no reason that their identity has to be tied to a particular body. The imperfect virtual copy I have of my mother that exists in my head will continue to exist after she dies and has, to some extent, an independent consciousness to my own - a separate, partial 'soul' that has thoughts that are different from mine. (As mentioned above, many of these ideas are inspired by Douglas Hofstadter - check out his book 'I Am A Strange Loop')

 

[dexxyoto]

remeber about 1000 years ago when people thought slaves did not have souls.....but they christened them just in case? (i am talking like roman empire) well untill we start getting nervous enfough to start doing that i will go with , maybe.......hey looks boats

 

[ultimateownage]

Only if they're in terrible sappy movies. But that applies for humans, too.

 

[Leg End]

Yes.

Because if humans have them, robots can sure as shit have them too. Better ones even in certain cases.

 

[Eclectic Dreck]

Nope. Theology is generally pretty reluctant to assert that anything save a Human has a soul. Until you have a machine that is indistinguishable from a human, it isn't even worth bringing up.

 

[Eclectic Dreck]

Well, no. But neither do humans so what's the problem?

This.

There's no such thing as a soul, so no.

Prove it.

prove there is a soul
OT: its a chunk of metal with electric running through it so no, it has no soul

I'd say the better response is simply that the burden of proof lies with the person making the extraordinary claim (in this case, that the Soul exists). Given that there is no evidence of a soul, any response would be forced into the realm of theology (which, as I pointed out, tends to assert that only People have souls) or philosophy (which is an effective way of making them go away as forming a coherent philosophical argument takes time, research, and a great many strong drinks).

 

[ZydrateDealer]

Regardless of it's ability to fall in love a robot has a soul...why the hell does a robot need to fall in love anyway? Sociopaths can't fall in love and they can only emulate emotions, but religious dogma states that they have souls because they're human...or a living being...or if you're animistic then because you are a thing.

Working from the animistic belief that even a featureless lump of rock has a soul then yeah they do. Working from a middle eastern religion's view point (Christianity/Judaism/Islam) no they don't because they are not human and don't contain the divine spark of god...though you could argue that because they were made by a man then the divine spark is transfered.

Working from my viewpoint, it's a machine created to serve and should be given the same respect we'd give a domesticated animal (wild animals should be given the right to be left alone). That is until it gains sentience and transcends being a simple machine and gains desires to do and see things and live a life; then it is equal to us and as such gains our responsibility to look after our world and further earth's glorious reach into the cosmos...but now I'm getting ahead of myself, first we need self aware robots who want to work with humanity and as part of humanity...but they'll probably see us for the plague we are and exterminate us.

 

[Ouroboros0977]

No and ask me again when robots have free will.... And I believe in souls.

 

[Nyerion]

There's a lot of possible meanings of the word. Let's try some:

- Immaterial essence that has some independent existence to our bodies and that survives our death
- Our free will, the aspect of us that has responsibility for our actions and which deserves to be punished or rewarded for them
- Our conscious self, the part that feels our pains and thinks our thoughts
- Our personal identity, what makes me me and you you.

This is a great answer. But I have a question regarding the last definition: since our personal identity is always changing (most of us change much more than we are willing to admit). Are we always changing our soul?

I don't mean to offend anyone, but I just don't see the point on believing in the soul. For me it's quite obvius that it is something that someone just made up. I cannot prove that there is no soul, but I cannot prove that Zeus doesn't exist or that there is no spirit of the rain.

 

[manythings]

Well, no. But neither do humans so what's the problem?

This.

There's no such thing as a soul, so no.

Prove it.

prove there is a soul
OT: its a chunk of metal with electric running through it so no, it has no soul

Well that was my point, neither side can prove the existence or lack of a soul so no one can say there is No soul without presenting something beyond their opinion as proof. I say the same to anyone who makes a definitive claim about anything we can't prove or disprove.

 

[Seneschal]

Do people really assume by default that souls exist? These days? I sincerely hope not.

The concept is just blatant rationalization, an easy explanation for our complex behaviour. And since humans have obvious reasons to believe in them (because it makes us special), it's reasonable to assume we made them up. Science has proven that complexity can arise spontaneously from simple interacting systems, no divine inspiration required there.

An A.I. would probably just be a bewilderingly complex set of algorithms that interact to create a flexible and free-willed consciousness like our own. It would just seem like it was "ensouled" because of emergence - the whole system does things that none of its component parts normally can. But that's just math, not spiritual force.

EDIT: And about its "rights" - if we get to the point where we can craft new intelligences, I guess we'll have to broaden our human rights into... "sentient rights" or something. But it might take a while for religious outrage to die down. I mean, pan-sentient rights would basically mean that we're all just AIs, only humans are biological.

I'm in love with my girlfriend, I'm not "in chemical reactions synapsing in my brain with my girlfriend."

Words are words, a soul simply is the poetic concept of the spark of life. The capability of reason, thoughts, emotions, self awareness, empathy, and introspection.

I swear, this new breed of cynical intellectuals really love putting a big vacuum and sucking out culture and poetry.

I'm no dry cognitive scientist, I'm a linguist. I perfectly understand the value of culture, but giving it arcane connotations is just setting back our understanding of the human condition. So what if you're just "synapsing"? If a natural instinct meant to help procreation can transcend its role into something that drives human society, isn't it that much more impressive?

Besides, the OP didn't use "soul" as a metaphor. He just assumed that self-aware beings need one because Judeo-Christian dogma mandates it.