Humans, animals and computers: Minding machines?

摘要

Are there minding machines? In this paper, I consult historical, philosophical, and empirical materials in trying to answer this intriguing question. My historical and philosophical discussions focus on five famous Frenchmen (Michele de Montaigne, René Descartes, Salomon de Caus, Julien Offray de La Mettrie, and Jacques Vaucanson) and one famous American (William James). My review of empirical research focuses on four topics in contemporary comparative cognition: associative/causal learning, shortterm memory, number discrimination, and metacognition. I conclude that minding machines do exist; they are humans and animals. Minding may be said to mediate the complex changes in behavior that humans and animals exhibit. However, computers and other mechanical devices are pale replicas that are built from the "wrong stuff." They will never attain the status of minding machines.