alt Hacker NewsSo an x86 CPU is thinking?
So many times I've seen it produce sensible, valid chains of results.
Yes, I see evidence in that outcome that a person somewhere thought and understood. I even sometimes say that a computer is "thinking hard" about something when it freezes up.
...but ascribing new philosophical meaning to this simple usage of the word "thinking" is a step too far. It's not even a new way of using the word!
You can't say for sure it is or it isn't thinking based solely on the substrate, because it's not known for sure if consciousness is dependent on the hardware it's running on -- for a lack of a better analogy -- to manifest, if it really needs an organic brain or if it could manifest in silicon based solutions.