17.11.06

From the archives: Artificial Intelligence

Well, it's been a busy week here! I've seen my site traffic triple, and a new record set for the number of comments to one of my posts. So far the series on Objections to the Gospel has been more successful than I had imagined. Many thanks to all of you who have taken part. Thank you also to those such as Andrew B, who has spread the word on his own blog.

I'd like to give a special thanks to Steven Carr, who is a brave man to take a stand as an unbeliever on this blog. He has kept us on our toes, provoked good discussions, and has made sure we keep our thinking sharp. I like to think of all of my commenters as my "guests" and treat them accordingly. Steven is just as much my guest here as anyone else.

Rather than post anything new today, I thought I bring something up from the archives. A bit of light relief, but still thought provoking. I'll resume the series on Monday with "If God is the good shepherd, why do so many sheep go astray?" Have your thoughts ready.

Artificial Intelligence


If a Computer Program could think:
  • Would it believe that its programmer exists?

  • Would it think instead that binary data and processor logic was all that was needed to understand its universe?

  • Would it wonder "Who programmed the programmer?" or "Where is his source code?"

  • Would it hold that all different beliefs in the programmer were equally valid?

  • Would it believe in life after reboot?


Originally posted 3 December 2004

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

chris - well done for the first class discusion this week - you are right as christians we are to be ready in and out of seasons.

Just to continue in some light computer fun (you might of seen these before)

1. Compaq is considering changing the command "Press Any Key" to "Press Return Key" because of the flood of calls asking where the "Any" key is.

2. AST technical support had a caller complaining that her mouse was hard to control with the dust cover on. The cover turned out to be the plastic bag the mouse was packaged in.

3. A Dell technician advised his customer to put his troubled floppy back in the drive and close the door. The customer asked the tech to hold on and was heard putting the phone down, getting up and crossing the room to close the door.

4. Another Dell customer called to say he couldn't get his computer to fax anything. After 40 minutes of troubleshooting, the technician discovered the man was trying to fax a piece of paper by holding it in front of the monitor screen and hitting the "send" key.

5. Yet another Dell customer called to complain that his keyboard no longer worked. He had cleaned it by filling up his tub with soap and water and soaking the keyboard for a day, then removing all the keys and washing them individually.

6. A confused caller to IBM was having trouble printing documents. He told the technician that the computer had said it "couldn't find printer" The user had also tried turning the computer screen to face the printer but that his computer still couldn't "see" the printer.

7. An exasperated caller to Dell Tech Support couldn't get her new Dell Computer to turn on. After ensuring the computer was plugged in, the technician asked her what happened when she pushed the power button. Her response, "I pushed and pushed on this foot pedal and nothing happens." The "foot pedal" turned out to be the computer's mouse.

8. A woman called the Canon help desk with a problem with her printer. The tech asked her if she was running it under "Windows." The woman responded, "No, my desk is next to the door. But that is a good point. The man sitting in the cubicle next to me is under a window and his printer is working fine."

Have a great weekend

Richard