grandidose thoughts...

I love the way Daniel Dennett patiently chides Marvin Minsky in this exchange:

Why is the idea of a thinking machine so compelling?
Minsky: I think there is a worldwide survival problem. As the population grows and people live longer, there won't be anybody to do the work. So there is an urgent need to make inexpensive mechanical people that are able to do all the things that moderately unskilled people do now.
Dennett: I don't find that very convincing, Marvin. I think we're interested in it for purely curious, scientific reasons. We want to know how we work.