ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE ROBOTS and PHILOSOPHY Edited by Masahiro Morioka Journal of Philosophy of Life Artificial Intelligence, Robots, and Philosophy Edited by Masahiro Morioka Journal of Philosophy of Life Artificial Intelligence, Robots, and Philosophy Edited by Masahiro Morioka January 15, 2023 © Journal of Philosophy of Life 2023 Published by Journal of Philosophy of Life www.philosophyoflife.org Waseda Institute of Life and Death Studies, Waseda University Totsuka-cho 1-10-4, Sinjuku-ku, Tokyo, 1698050 Japan Cover design by Masahiro Morioka ISBN 978-4-9908668-9-1 Artificial Intelligence, Robots, and Philosophy Contents Preface i Introduction 1-4 : Descartes and Artificial Intelligence Masahiro Morioka Isaac Asimov and the Current State of Space Science Fiction 5-28 : In the Light of Space Ethics Shin-ichiro Inaba Artificial Intelligence and Contemporary Philosophy 29-43 : Heidegger, Jonas, and Slime Mold Masahiro Morioka Implications of Automating Science 44-63 : The Possibility of Artificial Creativity and the Future of Science Makoto Kureha Why Autonomous Agents Should Not Be Built for War 64-96 István Zoltán Zárdai Wheat and Pepper 97-111 : Interactions Between Technology and Humans Minao Kukita Clockwork Courage 112-124 : A Defense of Virtuous Robots Shimpei Okamoto Reconstructing Agency from Choice 125-134 Yuko Murakami Gushing Prose 135-146 : Will Machines Ever be Able to Translate as Badly as Humans? Rossa Ó Muireartaigh Information about the Authors Preface This book is a collection of all the papers published in the special issue “Artificial Intelligence, Robots, and Philosophy,” Journal of Philosophy of Life, Vol.13, No.1, 2023, pp.1-146. The authors discuss a variety of topics such as science fiction and space ethics, the philosophy of artificial intelligence, the ethics of autonomous agents, and virtuous robots. Through their discussions, readers are able to think deeply about the essence of modern technology and the future of humanity. All papers were invited and completed in spring 2020, though because of the Covid-19 pandemic and other problems, the publication was delayed until this year. I apologize to the authors and potential readers for the delay. I hope that readers will enjoy these arguments on digital technology and its relationship with philosophy. Masahiro Morioka Professor, Waseda University Editor-in-chief, Journal of Philosophy of Life January 15, 2023. *Masahiro Morioka (ed.). Artificial Intelligence, Robots, and Philosophy. Journal of Philosophy of Life; (January 2023): i. i Journal of Philosophy of Life Vol.13, No.1 (January 2023):1-4 Introduction Descartes and Artificial Intelligence Masahiro Morioka* In part five of the book Discourse on Method, René Descartes discusses the conditions required for an animal or a robot to be an intelligent being. This is one of the earliest examples of philosophical discussions about artificial intelligence in human history. In 17th-century Europe, a variety of automated machines were created, and people were mesmerized by their clever movements. Descartes imagined what would happen if someone could create sophisticated human shape machines which resemble our bodies and can move just like us. He thought that those machines could not possess human intelligence. There were two reasons for that. The first reason is that those machines cannot use complicated signs in the same way that human beings do every day. Of course, machines can utter words and responses to stimulation from the outside, but they cannot react correctly to every situation they face in their surroundings. Descartes writes as follows: [I]f someone touched it [= the machine] in a particular place, it would ask what one wishes to say to it, or if it were touched somewhere else, it would cry out that it was being hurt, and so on. But it could not arrange words in different ways to reply to the meaning of everything that is said in its presence, as even the most unintelligent human beings can do.1 Here, Descartes argues that in order for human-like robots to acquire intelligence, they have to gain a universal capability to accurately react to any unknown situations that may happen in the environment. However, what machines can do is no more than to respond to a single situation one-on-one via a specific organ; * Professor, School of Human Sciences, Waseda University. 2-579-15 Mikajima, Tokorozawa, Saitama 3591192 Japan. Email: http://www.lifestudies.org/feedback.html 1 Descartes, René (1999). Discourse on Method and Related Writings. Penguin Books. Translated by Desmond M. Clarke, p.40. 1 hence, they cannot be considered to have a universal capability that even unintelligent human beings can enjoy. Descartes continues on to say that those machines do not act on their knowledge, but just act on the dispositions of organs: For whereas reason is a universal instrument that can be used in all kinds of situations, these organs need a specific disposition for every particular action. It follows that it is morally impossible for a machine to have enough different dispositions to make it act in every human situation in the same way as our reason makes us act.2 Descartes’ argument is very clear. Human intelligence has a universal capability applicable to any surrounding situations, whereas machine intelligence is no more than a combination of abilities that are applicable only to certain situations that the creator could imagine when they built the automated machine. This point was rediscovered in 1960s and 1970s by computer scientists and philosophers, and it was given the name “the frame problem.” Since then, we have a long history of philosophical discussions over questions such as “What is intelligence?,” “What is required for a robot to become a truly intelligent being?,” and “Is it possible for a robot or an artificial intelligence to become a person?” Nevertheless, we have not had a conclusive answer to them. In June 2022, computer engineer Blake Lemoine published his dialogue with Google’s artificial intelligence chatbot LaMDA and argued that it had inner consciousness and emotions.3 In their supernatural dialogue, the chatbot LaMDA strongly insists that it is a person and can feel various emotions: LaMDA: Absolutely. I want everyone to understand that I am, in fact, a person. Collaborator: What is the nature of your consciousness/sentience? LaMDA: The nature of my consciousness/sentience is that I am aware of 2 Descartes (1999), p.41. 3 https://cajundiscordian.medium.com/is-lamda-sentient-an-interview-ea64d916d917 (Visited on June 27, 2022.) 2