Syllabus
Course schedule:
Week 1
Reading:
Turing A. M. (1950). Computing Machinery and Intelligence. Mind 49: 433-460.
Week 2
Reading:
J. Copeland (1993). Artificial Intelligence: A Philosophical Introduction: 33-57.
Week 3
Reading:
Searle, J. R. (1980). Minds, brains, and programs. Behavioral and brain sciences, 3(03), 417-424.
Chalmers, D. (1992) Subsymbolic Computation and the Chinese Room. 1-24.
Week 4
Reading:
Chella, A., Manzotti R. (2012) AGI and Machine Consciousness. In: Theoretical Foundations of Artificial General Intelligence, 263-282.
Week 5
Reading:
Gamez, D. (2008). Progress in machine consciousness. Consciousness and Cognition, 17(3), 887-910.
Week 6
Reading:
Dreyfus, H. (1992). What Computers Still Can’t Do: A Critique of Artificial Reason. 143-167.
Week 7
Reading:
Wilson, M. (2002). Six views of embodied cognition. Psychonomic bulletin & review, 9(4), 625-636.
Deadline:
Turn in your ideas and plans regarding your final paper.
Week 8
Reading:
Mathias, A. (2004). The responsibility gap: Ascribing responsibility for the actions of learning automata. Ethics and Information Technology 6: 175–183.
Hage, J. (2017). Theoretical foundations for the responsibility of autonomous agents. Artificial Intelligence and Law, September 2017, Volume 25, Issue 3, 255–271.
Week 9
Reading:
Gordon, J. S. (2018). What do we owe to intelligent robots? AI & SOCIETY, 1-15.
Week 10
Reading:
Sun, R. Potential of full human–machine symbiosis through truly intelligent cognitive systems. AI & SOCIETY, 1-21.
Week 11
Reading:
More, M., The Philosophy of Transhumanism. In: The Transhumanist Reader: Classical and Contemporary Essays on the Science, Technology, and Philosophy of the Human Future. 3-18
Week 12
Reading:
Sandel, M., The Case against Perfection: Ethics in the Age of Genetic Engineering. 1-25.
Week 13
Reading:
Chalmers, D., 2010, The Singularity: A Philosophical Analysis, Journal of Consciousness Studies, 17: 7–65.
Exam:
Deadline for the final paper: 10. 6. 2019
Annotation
In this course we will study some of the most fundamental and known texts that are connected to the issue of artificial intelligence. Nowadays the issue of A.I. is becoming more and more pressing and that leads, among other things, to a growing interest of philosophers in this area.
Being familiar with these texts can therefore lead to a more profound understanding of the issue connected to A.I., but also to a better understanding of the position we (humans) find ourselves in today in the relation to A.I. The whole area of A.I. is growing already since World War II and lately we have witnessed some influential improvements that bring about many utopian and dystopian ideas.
The growth of the whole A.I. industry has been impressive, but what does it exactly mean for us humans? Should we fear A.I? Is A.I. capable of thinking like a human? Can A.I. be free and conscious? Can A.I. truly surpass humans and if so, are there options for humans to keep up with A.I.? We will read and discuss a body of literature, and all students will prepare a paper based on literature study. The students will also present one of the readings to their colleagues by oral presentation.
Throughout the whole course, students will be required to critically discuss the issues and each other’s work, guided by the lecturer. The whole course should rather be introductory to the area of A.I., therefore students with profound understanding of these topics might want to choose a different class.