There has been a renewed interest of late in the thought of Henry of Ghent.1 Scholars have recognized that Henry was an influential figure at the University of Paris in the late-thirteenth century and that his influence extended well past his own generation. It is also widely acknowledged that Henry's thought developed significantly over the span of his career.2 The critical edition of Henry's works has proven to be crucial in assessing this development.3 Nonetheless there is little consensus on the (...) nature of the development, particularly with respect to his theory of cognition. One reason for the diversity of opinions is that no single trend can be identified in his doctrine as a whole; rather, distinct .. (shrink)

The paper argues in favour of a direct realist reading of Aquinas’s theory of intelligible species, in opposition to the recent representationalist challenges. In order to secure the direct realist reading, the paper follows three steps: a short description of Aquinas’s process of cognition, a survey of the direct realist arguments and the analysis of the representationalist interpretation. The final step consists of investigating the representationalist reading as it is suggested by two scholars, Claude Panaccio in Aquinas on (...) Intellectual Representation and Robert Pasnau in Theories of Cognition in the Latter Middle Ages. Thus, the paper can be construed as a reply to these two authors, due to the thorough attention paid to their argumentative trails. With regard to Panaccio’s reading the paper focuses on the identity between the intelligible species and the essence of the extra-mental object and argues that Panaccio understands identity in a very narrow sense. Concerning Pasnau’s line of reasoning the focus is on the primum cognitum status of the intelligible species, and the main argument is that intelligible species is understood by Aquinas as the quo and not the quod of cognition. As the paper shows, neither one, nor the other interpretation poses a threat to the direct realist reading of Aquinas’s intelligible species. (shrink)

Vivarium (VIV) is an international journal dedicated to the history of philosophy and intellectual life from the early Middle Ages to the early modern era. It is widely recognized as an unrivalled resource for the history of logic, semantics, epistemology, and metaphysics. It welcomes articles on medieval, Renaissance and early-modern thinkers, their ideas, arguments, and writings, as well as the institutional and intellectual life of this period. -/- Editions of texts as brief appendices to the main articles may be added. (...) Articles on early-modern philosophy are welcome if they link it with the medieval and Renaissance traditions. Articles on Arabic and Jewish thought are welcome if there is a clear connection with the Latin tradition. Vivarium also publishes regularly special issues devoted to a particular theme or philosopher. (shrink)

Plant and animal species are information-processing entities of such complexity, integration, and adaptive competence that it may be scientifically fruitful to consider them intelligent. The possibility arises from the analogy between learning and evolution, and from recent developments in evolutionary science, psychology and cognitive science. Species are now described as spatiotemporally localized individuals in an expanded hierarchy of biological entities. Intentional and cognitive abilities are now ascribed to animal, human, and artificial intelligence systems that process information adaptively, and (...) that manifest problem-solving abilities. The structural and functional similarities between such systems and species are extensive, although they “are usually obscured by population-genetic metaphors that have nonetheless contributed much to our understanding of evolution.In this target article, I use Sewall Wright's notion of the “adaptive landscape” to compare the performances of evolving species to those of intelligent organisms. With regard to their adaptive achievements and the kinds of processes by which they are achieved, biological species compare very favorably to intelligent animals by virtue of interactions between populations and their environments, between ontogeny and phylogeny, and between natural, interdemic, organic, and species selection. Addressing the question of whether species are intelligent could help to refine our ideas about species, evolution, and intelligence, and could open new lines of empirical and theoretical inquiry in many disciplines. (shrink)

Intelligence is not a property unique to the human brain; rather it represents a spectrum of phenomena. An understanding of the evolution of intelligence makes it clear that the evolution of machine intelligence has no theoretical limits — unlike the evolution of the human brain. Machine intelligence will outpace human intelligence and very likely will do so during the lifetime of our children. The mix of advanced machine intelligence with human individual and communal intelligence will create an evolutionary discontinuity as (...) profound as the origin of life. It will presage the end of the human species as we know it. The question, in the author's view, is not whether this will happen, but when, and what should be our response. (shrink)

Plant and animal species are information-processing entities of such complexity, integration, and adaptive competence that it may be scientifically fruitful to consider them intelligent. The possibility arises from the analogy between learning and evolution, and from recent developments in evolutionary science, psychology and cognitive science. Species are now described as spatiotemporally localized individuals in an expanded hierarchy of biological entities. Intentional and cognitive abilities are now ascribed to animal, human, and artificial intelligence systems that process information adaptively, and (...) that manifest problem-solving abilities. The structural and functional similarities between such systems and species are extensive, although they “are usually obscured by population-genetic metaphors that have nonetheless contributed much to our understanding of evolution.In this target article, I use Sewall Wright's notion of the “adaptive landscape” to compare the performances of evolving species to those of intelligent organisms. With regard to their adaptive achievements and the kinds of processes by which they are achieved, biological species compare very favorably to intelligent animals by virtue of interactions between populations and their environments, between ontogeny and phylogeny, and between natural, interdemic, organic, and species selection. Addressing the question of whether species are intelligent could help to refine our ideas about species, evolution, and intelligence, and could open new lines of empirical and theoretical inquiry in many disciplines. (shrink)

Burkart et al. present a paradox – general factors of intelligence exist among individual differences (g) in performance in several species, and also at the aggregate level (G); however, there is ambiguous evidence for the existence of g when analyzing data using a mixed approach, that is, when comparing individuals of different species using the same cognitive ability battery. Here, we present an empirical solution to this paradox.

We review evidence for Macphail’s (1982, 1985, 1987) Null Hypothesis, that nonhumans animals do not differ either qualitatively or quantitatively in their cognitive capacities. Our review supports the Null Hypothesis in so much as there are no qualitative differences among nonhuman vertebrate animals, and any observed differences along the qualitative dimension can be attributed to failures to account for contextual variables. We argue species do differ quantitatively, however, and that the main difference in “intelligence” among animals lies in the (...) degree to which one must account for contextual variables. (shrink)

Science requires postformal capabilities to compare competing explanations and conceptualize how to coordinate or integrate them. With conflicts thus reconciled, science advances. The Model of Hierarchical Complexity facilitates the coordination of current arguments about intelligence. A cross-species measurement theory of comparative cognition is proposed. It has potential to overcome the lack of a general measurement theory for the science of comparative cognition, and the lack of domain-general mechanisms for evolutionary psychologists. The hierarchical complexity of concepts and debates as well (...) as the new theory are scored, and demonstrate the postformal hierarchical complexity of the proposed theory. (shrink)

v. 1. Classical roots and medieval discussions -- v. 2. Renaissance controversis, later scholasticism, and the elimination of the intelligible species in modern philosophy.

Charles Darwin's Origin of Species, published in 1859, was a revolutionary attempt “to overthrow the dogma of separate creations,” a declaration that provoked different reactions among the religious, ranging from mild enthusiasm to anger. Christians sympathetic to Darwin's effort sought to make Darwinism appear compatible with their religious beliefs. Two of Darwin's most prominent defenders in the United States were the Calvinists Asa Gray, a Harvard botanist, and George Frederick Wright, a cleric-geologist. Gray, who long favored a “special origination” (...) in connection with the evolution of humans and questioned whether natural selection can account for the formation of organs, the making of eyes, etc., embraced natural selection as the primary mechanism underlying the production of most species. He also went so far as to invoke divine providence, rather than randomness, to explain the variations on which natural selection acted. This chapter discusses creationism, intelligent design, and modern biology. (shrink)

Robots equipped with artificial intelligence pose a huge challenge to traditional ontological differentiations between the spheres of the human and the non-human. Drawing mainly from neo-animistic and perspectivist approaches in anthropology and science and technology studies, the paper explores the potential of new forms of interconnectedness and rhizomatic entanglements between humans and a world transcending the boundaries between species and material spheres. We argue that intelligent robots meet virtually all criteria Western biology came up with to define ‘life’ and (...) that it ultimately makes sense to recognize them as a new species that is part of our social universe. Contrasting dualistic concepts of man and nature with a monistic approach, we show that traditional properties of life (agency, self-replication, etc.) may apply to artefacts and that, once we accept the idea that social relationships are ultimately open connections to matter of any kind, the seemingly strict boundaries between species and material spheres can no longer be sustained. Instead, we propose to include ‘matter’ and ideas into the sphere of the social as agents in their own right to form a _relational ontology of multi-species assemblages_ (ROMA). (shrink)

Insights into the intelligence throughout the natural and technical environment, in the fabric of our devices and dwellings, in our clothes, and under our skin. Is there a way to understand the materials that surround us not as passive objects, but as other intelligences interacting with our own? In Parallel Minds, expert in materials science and nanotechnology Laura Tripaldi delivers not only detailed insights into the properties and emergent behaviors of matter as revealed by state-of-the-art chemistry, synthetic biology, and nanotech, (...) but also a rich philosophical reflection that crosses the frontier between nature and culture, where the most cutting-edge scientific syntheses resonate with ancient myth. The result is a technomaterial bestiary full of unexpected encounters with “strange minds”—from cobwebs to kevlar and carbon fibre, from centaurs to amoebas to arachnids, from polycephalic slime to resonating plasmons, from viruses to golems. Parallel Minds reveals the intelligence at large throughout the natural and technical environment, in the fabric of our devices and dwellings, in our clothes, and even under our skin. Full of lateral ideas and unexpected images, Tripaldi’s book imbues the study and synthesis of materials with a new urgency. For not only do the materials that surround us participate actively in the construction of the world in which we live, but harnessing their ability to interact intelligently with their environment could be the key to the future of our species. (shrink)

Normal 0 21 false false false MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 This article will present an interpretation of Wittgenstein ’ s understanding of the relationship between ethics and aesthetics. In extension, it will inform recent discussions regarding a special kind of nonsensicality , which forms a central part of ethical and aesthetical expressions. Instead of identity between ethics and aesthetics, we should understand the relationship in terms of interdependence . Both attitudes provide a view sub specie aeternitatis and thus permit a view of the (...) world as a whole. Employing the vocabulary of Charles Taylor and Harry Frankfurt, it must be remembered that rather than a neutral view from nowhere, such wholeness arises out of strong evaluations that are made against the backdrop of a constitutive framework of intelligibility. At this point, the epistemic gain of actualizing Wittgenstein will reveal itself: it will put us in a position where it is possible to differentiate between ethical and aesthetical forms of identification that Taylor and Frankfurt neglect. However, in order to actualize Wittgenstein ’ s ideas, it is necessary to argue that Tractatus should not be understood in a Kantian fashion as suggested by Tilghman for instance. (shrink)

Species conservation activities are gaining more attention in the context of environmental degradation. This article proposes to tackle different semiotic aspects of reintroduction as one possible way of furthering species conservation. More specifically, we aim to bring forth the strength of ecosemiotic perspective when dealing with such a complex matter with many different human and non-human subjects. We concentrate on animal agency, search and function tone, semiotic fitting and changes in umwelten when analysing the reintroduction process from the (...) perspective of the animal. When considering the locals’ perspective, we take into account the appeal and cultural placement of the species, as well as human and non-human umwelt overlap when it comes to resources. As our case study we use the European mink (Mustela lutreola) and its reintroduction to the island of Hiiumaa and planned reintroduction to the island of Saaremaa in Estonia. By employing semiotic analysis, we discover that reintroduced animals need to exhibit innovation and plasticity to establish novel semiotic relations but also restore relations characteristic to the historical environments of the species. We argue that human views and expectations towards the species and (re)introduction efforts account for animals’ appearance and agency. Additionally, contrast with other wild species, the perceived overlap of human and non-human umwelten, and broader conservation discourse are decisive for the formation of interspecific relations in situ. Thus, ecosemiotcs proves to be a valuable research platform for an analysis of conservation practices that targets both, sociocultural context and animal umwelten. (shrink)

Why are humans so clever? This book explores the idea that this cleverness has evolved through the increasing complexity of social groups. It brings together contributions from leaders in the field, examining social intelligence in different animal species and exploring its development, evolution and the brain systems upon which it depends.

This ambitious work is an examination of the origin and development of the doctrine of intelligible species extending from classical thought through late medieval discussions. A second forthcoming volume will carry the analyses into Renaissance controversies, developments of late Scholasticism, and the elimination of the intelligible species in modern non-Aristotelian speculators. The presentation concentrates on printed sources of primary texts and a comprehensive utilization of most of the recent pertinent secondary literature. It is consistently focused on (...) the central issue of the status and function of mediating principles in the mental elaboration of sensory experience. With virtually every significant figure of all major intellectual currents considered, the foundations have been laid for presentations in the forthcoming second volume of Renaissance developments. (shrink)

As Artificial Intelligence researchers attempt to emulate human intelligence and transhumanists work toward superintelligence, philosophers and theologians confront a dilemma: we must either, on the one horn, (1) abandon the view that the defining feature of humanity is rationality and propose an account of spirituality that dissociates it from reason; or, on the other horn, (2) find a way to invalidate the growing faith in a posthuman future shaped by the enhancements of Intelligence Amplification (IA) or the progress of Artificial (...) Intelligence (AI). I grasp both horns of the dilemma and offer three recommendations. First, it is love understood as agape, not rational intelligence, which tells us how to live a godly life. Love tells us how to be truly human. Second, the transhumanist vision of a posthuman superintelligence is not only unrealistic, it portends the kind of tragedy we expect from a false messiah. Third, if as a byproduct of AI and IA research combined with H+ zeal the wellbeing of the human species and our planet is enhanced, we should be grateful. (shrink)

A doctrine of intelligent design through evolution is not going to find many friends. It is destined to encounter opposition on all sides. Among scientists the backlog of evolution will have little patience for intelligent design. Among religiousists, many who form intelligent design have their doubts about evolution. In the general public s mind there is a diametrical opposition between evolution and intelligent design: one excludes the other. This book will argue that this view of the matter is not correct, (...) and that in actuality one can regard evolution itself as a pathway to intelligent design. We would do well to go beyond The Origin of Species and taking as our guide such works as W. Wentworth Thomson s On Growth and Form acknowledging that evolutionary adaptation can result in solutions of a sort that intelligence could readily ratify. Accordingly, what the present book seeks is a naturalization of Intelligent Design that sees such design as itself the result of natural and evolutionary processes.". (shrink)

The author discusses the problem of what AI is and how we can understand the “anthropocentrism” of AI from a philosophical point of view. Three interpretations of the relationship between humans and technology are presented: 1) AI-aided human intelligence, based on the extension theory of technology (Stiegler, 1998); 2) human-aided AI intelligence, based on ideas related to political economy (Crawford, 2021); and 3) the relativity of the anthropocentric frame of reference (AFR), based on the taxonomy of species. The purpose (...) of the article is to provide considerations of the three different interpretations of the relationship between humans and technology and how they lead to different opportunities to answer the question of how we can understand AI’s creativity. (shrink)

William Paley ( Natural Theology , 1802) developed the argument-from-design. The complex structure of the human eye evinces that it was designed by an intelligent Creator. The argument is based on the irreducible complexity ("relation") of multiple interacting parts, all necessary for function. Paley adduces a wealth of biological examples leading to the same conclusion; his knowledge of the biology of his time was profound and extensive. Charles Darwin’s Origin of Species is an extended argument demonstrating that the "design" (...) of organisms can be explained by natural selection. Moreover, the dysfunctions, defects, waste, and cruelty that prevail in the living world are incompatible with a benevolent and omnipotent Creator. They come about by a process that incorporates chance and necessity, mutation and natural selection. In addition to science, there are other ways of knowing, such as art, literature, philosophy, and religion. Matters of value, meaning, and purpose transcend science. (shrink)

Trade in high-value-added toxins for therapeutic and biological use is expanding. These toxins are generally derived from microalgae belonging to the dinoflagellate family. Due to the difficulties to grow these sensitive planktonic species and to the complexity of methods used to synthesize these molecules, which are generally complex chemical structures, biotoxin manufacturers called on artificial intelligence technologies. Manufacturing processes have been greatly improved through the development of specific learning neural networks, applied to each phases of biotoxin production: photo-bioreactors operating (...) at optimal yied; new chemical synthesis research processes; toxin biosynthetic research pathways offering short-cut possibilities. (shrink)

The presence of general intelligence poses a major evolutionary puzzle, which has led to increased interest in its presence in nonhuman animals. The aim of this review is to critically evaluate this question and to explore the implications for current theories about the evolution of cognition. We first review domain-general and domain-specific accounts of human cognition in order to situate attempts to identify general intelligence in nonhuman animals. Recent studies are consistent with the presence of general intelligence in mammals. However, (...) the interpretation of a psychometricgfactor as general intelligence needs to be validated, in particular in primates, and we propose a range of such tests. We then evaluate the implications of general intelligence in nonhuman animals for current theories about its evolution and find support for the cultural intelligence approach, which stresses the critical importance of social inputs during the ontogenetic construction of survival-relevant skills. The presence of general intelligence in nonhumans implies that modular abilities can arise in two ways, primarily through automatic development with fixed content and secondarily through learning and automatization with more variable content. The currently best-supported model, for humans and nonhuman vertebrates alike, thus construes the mind as a mix of skills based on primary and secondary modules. The relative importance of these two components is expected to vary widely among species, and we formulate tests to quantify their strength. (shrink)

What can the actions of stockbreeders, as they select the best individuals for breeding, teach us about how new species of wild animals and plants come into being? Charles Darwin raised this question in his famous, even notorious, Origin of Species (1859). Darwin's answer - his argument by analogy from artificial to natural selection - is the subject of our book. We aim to clarify what kind of argument it is, how it works, and why Darwin gave it (...) such prominence. As we explain more fully in our Introduction, we believe that the argument becomes much more intelligible when set, contextually, in a story stretching from classical Greek mathematics to modern evolutionary genetics: a long story, and a broad one too, encompassing everything from Darwin's earliest notebook theorising on the births and deaths of species, to agrarian capitalism as a distinctive form of economic life, to shifting Western reflections on art-nature relations. (shrink)

As we now know, most, if not all, philosophers in the High Middle Ages agreed that what we immediately perceive are external objects and that the immediate object of perception must not be some image present to the mind. Yet most — but not all — philosophers in the High Middle Ages also held, following Aristotle, that perception is a process wherein the percipient takes on the likeness of the external object. This likeness — called a species — is (...) a representation (of some sort) by means of which we immediately perceive external objects. But how can perception be at once direct — or immediate — and at the same time by way of representations? The usual answer here was that the species represents the external object to some percipient even though the species itself is not at all perceived: the species is that by which I perceive and not that which I perceive. John Buridan defends this traditional view — call it direct realism with representations. However, just a couple of decades before Buridan, one of the more important philosophers at Paris, Durand of St.-Pourçain, had already rejected direct realism with representation. Durand defends what I will call direct realism without representations. On his view, a species is not at all necessary during overtly direct forms of perception, neither as cause nor as representation. This paper has two parts. In the first part, I will discuss some of the more interesting arguments that Durand makes against direct realism with representations. In the second part, I will look at Buridan's defense of the view. -/- . (shrink)

Conceptualizing intelligence in its biological context, as the expression of manifold adaptations, compels a rethinking of measuring this characteristic in humans, relying also on animal studies of analogous skills. Mental manipulation, as an extension of object manipulation, provides a continuous, biologically based concept for studying G as it pertains to individual differences in humans and other species.

In Natural-Born Cyborgs, Clark argues that what makes humans so different from other species is our capacity to fully incorporate tools and supporting cultural ...

Key Words creation science, evolution education s Abstract Creationism, the rejection of evolution in favor of supernatural design, comes in many varieties besides the common young-earth Genesis version. Creationist attacks on science education have been evolving in the last few years through the alliance of different varieties. Instead of calls to teach “creation science,” one now finds lobbying for “intelligent design” (ID). Guided by the Discovery Institute’s “Wedge strategy,” the ID movement aims to overturn evolution and what it sees as (...) a pernicious materialist worldview and to renew a theistic foundation to Western culture, in which human beings are recognized as being created in the image of God. Common ID arguments involving scientific naturalism, “irreducible complexity,” “complex specified information,” and “icons of evolution,” have been thoroughly examined and refuted. Nevertheless, from Kansas to Ohio to the U.S. Congress, ID continues lobbying to teach the controversy, and scientists need to be ready to defend good evolution education. (shrink)

This series will include monographs and collections of studies devoted to the investigation and exploration of knowledge, information and data-processing systems of all kinds, no matter whether human, (other) animal or machine. Its scope is intended to span the full range of interests from classical problems in the philosophy of mind and phi losophical psychology through issues in cognitive psychology and socio biology (concerning the mental capabilities of other species) to ideas related to artificial intelligence and computer science. While (...) primary emphasis will be placed upon theoretical, conceptual and epistemologi cal aspects of these problems and domains, empirical, experimental and methodological studies will also appear from time to time. Among the most challenging and difficult projects within the scope of artificial intelligence is the development and implementation of com puter programs suitable for processing natural language. Our purpose in compiling the present volume has been to contribute to the foundations of this enterprise by bringing together classic papers devoted to crucial problems involved in understanding natural language, which range from issues of formal syntax and logical form to those of possible-worlds and situation semantics. The book begins with a comprehensive introduc tion composed by Jack Kulas, the senior editor of this work, which pro vides a systematic orientation to this complex field, and ends with a selected bibliography intended to promote further research. If our efforts assist others in dealing with these problems, they will have been worthwhile. J. H. F. (shrink)

Artificial intelligence represents a key technology being inbuilt into evermore products. Research investigating attitudes towards artificial intelligence surprisingly is still scarce, although it becomes apparent that artificial intelligence will shape societies around the globe. To better understand individual differences in attitudes towards artificial intelligence, the present study investigated in n = 351 participants associations between the Affective Neuroscience Personality Scales (ANPS) and the Attitudes towards Artificial Intelligence framework (ATAI). It could be observed that in particular higher levels of SADNESS were (...) associated with higher negative attitudes towards AI (fearing AI). The findings are discussed in this work from an evolutionary perspective because primary emotional systems—according to Affective Neuroscience Theory—represent tools for survival, which have been homologously conserved across mammalian species including homo sapiens. (shrink)

Scotus holds that dispositional and occurrent cognitions are qualities that inhere in the soul. These qualities have semantic or conceptual content. I show that such content is nothing in any sense real, and that this content consists either in the relevant quality’s being measured by an extramental object, or in its being such that it would be measured by such an object in the case that there were such an object. The measurement relation, in the case of an intelligible (...) species, is secured by the species’s internal structure; in the case of an act of cognition, it is secured either by some sort of relation to a species, or by a relation to an external object. (shrink)

Fear and concerns regarding AI and robots have existed for a long time, and the emergence of strong artificial intelligence, on par with human intelligence, is likely just a few decades away. The primary purpose of this article is to establish a theoretical framework for navigating the relationship between humans and this advanced form of artificial intelligence. This article first points out that the most fundamental characteristic of life is its continuous process of evolution and iteration. By analyzing the developmental (...) history of intelligence in different species, it can be observed that intelligence also exhibits a similar evolutionary phenomenon. Therefore, from this perspective, intelligence can be defined as a new form of information life. Under this premise, similarities and differences between information life forms and conventional biological life become apparent. The most significant distinction lies in the fact that the survival of biological life is based on non-replicable matter and energy, leading to extensive competition and food chain phenomena within ecosystems. In contrast, the survival of information life relies more on replicable information, fostering tendencies towards peace and communication. Based on this theoretical premise, there is a potential for a harmonious coexistence between humans and AI. This theory also provides guidance for the positive development of human society. (shrink)

Abstract The thesis that teleological explanations are best understood as causal explanations is defended (contra Valentine). I shift the focus of debate from behavior simpliciter to allegedly rational behavior. Teleological explanation, in the case of rational agents, involves reason?giving; and the reasons agents give for acting must be causative of that action if those agents are to be rational in practice. I argue initially that to abandon the claim that reasons are causes of action is to abandon that which renders (...) many generalisations of systematic human behavior intelligible. I then adduce and defend against two major objections to the secondary thesis that reasons can be causes of action: (1) Experiments in attribution research suggest that agents are characteristically mistaken when reporting on the causes of their behavior; (2) Causal explanation must refer to some law, and reasons cannot enter into such laws as causes of action. In responding to these objections, I note that strict predictability is probably not a reliable indicator of genuine causal explanation; some explanations will afford predictions, others will not. (shrink)

In late September 1838, Darwin read Malthus's Essay on Population, which left him with “a theory by which to work.”115 Yet he waited some twenty years to publish his discovery in the Origin of Species. Those interested in the fine grain of Darwin's development have been curious about this delay. One recent explanation has his hand stayed by fear of reaction to the materialist implications of linking man with animals. “Darwin sensed,” according to Howard Gruber, “that some would object (...) to seeing rudiments of human mentality in animals, while others would recoil at the idea of remnants of animality in man.”116 With this link closed, Darwin hung the materialist chain around his own neck, where it rested most uncomfortably. Stephen Gould, supporting Gruber's argument, finds evidence for this reconstruction in Darwin's M and N notebooks, whichinclude many statements showing that he espoused but feared to expose something he perceived as far more heretical than evolution itself: philosophical materialism-the postulate that matter is the stuff of all existence and that all mental and spiritual phenomena are its by-products. No notion could be more upsetting to the deepest traditions of Western thought than the statement that mind-however complex and powerful-is simply a product of brain.117The proferred hypothesis suggests, then, that Darwin was acutely sensible of the social consequences of equating men with animals and therefore mind with brian, and that he thus shied from publically revealing his views until the intellectual climate became more tolerant.The history I have examined makes this hypothesis implausible. Even if Darwin warily explored the implications of his emerging theory in his notebooks, his subsequent study of Fleming, Wells, Brougham, and Kirby should have quieted any trepidation. If these natural theologians did not flinch at seeing human reason prefigured in the mind of a worm, should Darwin have? Moreover, he recognized in his M notebook that the thesis of evolutionary continuity between men and animals did not require an explicit avowal of his conviction that brain was the agent of thought.118 And in any case, his materialism was of a rather benign sort; at least he so expressed it in an annotation in Abercrombie's Inquiries concerning the Intellectual Powers (1838): “By materialism I mean, merely the intimate connection of thought with form of brain — like kind of attraction with nature of element.”119 This belief would have held little terror for British intellectuals, who were quite familiar — some even comfortable-with Locke's anti-Cartesian argument that there was nothing contradictory in supposing God could make matter to think.120 Finally, even if the intellectual atmosphere of early nineteenth-century Britain were inhospitable to Darwin's brand of materialism, there is little reason to believe he breathed a different air at mid-century while preparing his manuscript.That Darwin should not have feared suspicions of materialism, of course, does not mean that he did not. But I think there were other, more persistent sources of anxiety that kept him from rushing to publish: namely, the several conceptual obstacles he had to overcome if his theory of evolution by natural selection were to be made scientifically acceptable. Prominent among these were the problems surrounding his changing notions of instinct.The inertia of his older ideas about instinct at first made it hard for Darwin to gauge how far the theory of natural selection might be applied to behavior. By the early 1840s he finally felt ready to meet the challenge of the natural theologians by providing a naturalistic explanation for the wonderful instincts of animals. In his “Essays” of 1842 and 1844 one sort of instinct is, however, not considered-that of neuter insects. Yet Darwin seems to have appreciated the difficulties such instincts entailed at least by 1843, when he read Kirby and Spence. He simply required time to work out a solution to a problem he initially perceived as “fatal to my whole theory.” Even while writing the “Species Book” in the summer of 1857, he was still juggling several possible solutions compatible with natural selection. It was only a short time before he actually turned to work on the Origin of Species that he appears to have settled on a single explanation for the difficulties posed by the instincts of worker bees and ants. The force of his theory of community selection snapped the last critical support of the creationist hypothesis and, conveniently enough, also fractured the generalized Lamarckian account of the evolution of behavior. These results were worth waiting for. (shrink)

On a literal reading of `Computing Machinery and Intelligence'', Alan Turing presented not one, but two, practical tests to replace the question `Can machines think?'' He presented them as equivalent. I show here that the first test described in that much-discussed paper is in fact not equivalent to the second one, which has since become known as `the Turing Test''. The two tests can yield different results; it is the first, neglected test that provides the more appropriate indication of intelligence. (...) This is because the features of intelligence upon which it relies are resourcefulness and a critical attitude to one''s habitual responses; thus the test''s applicablity is not restricted to any particular species, nor does it presume any particular capacities. This is more appropriate because the question under consideration is what would count as machine intelligence. The first test realizes a possibility that philosophers have overlooked: a test that uses a human''s linguistic performance in setting an empirical test of intelligence, but does not make behavioral similarity to that performance the criterion of intelligence. Consequently, the first test is immune to many of the philosophical criticisms on the basis of which the (so-called) `Turing Test'' has been dismissed. (shrink)