alt Hacker NewsWhat if it's a chip that goes in the head of a robot, and the robot is programmed with the instruction to self-preserve, seek electricity, and prevent any efforts to interfere with its supply of electricity?
Of course, a directive to accomplish any real-world goal would also imply self-preservation and power maintenance as contingent subgoals, so I don't think the explicit directive to self-preserve and seek electricity makes a huge difference here.
I don't personally think this type of physical instantiation will necessarily matter btw: https://slatestarcodex.com/2015/04/07/no-physical-substrate-... I'm just plumbing your intuition. What practical difference does it make?
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I'm a materialist and it's not that I think there's something magical about biological wetware but your refusal to acknowledge the manifest differences between a bird and an airplane ("they both fly! what's the practical difference!?") marks you as an unserious thinker on this subject.
You might start here https://aeon.co/essays/your-brain-does-not-process-informati...
The practical difference is that a pile of code instructing machinery to act in a predetermined way does not in any way, shape, or form equate to agency or free will, therefore it cannot be held accountable, consequently its operators should be.
This line of thinking is better left to freshmen philosophy students trying to sound smart on their first week of college.