A human body is vehicle for the human brain; it is not integral to the identity of the person.
The human body is a vehicle for the brain, in that without it, the brain would not be able to operate and think. However, there are many different types of bodies (i.e., humans can have large or small bodies), and all have different capabilities; therefore, though a person's body is important so they may live, it does not make them who they are.
The brain is what enables a person to think, therefore it makes sense that you would not be able to think without your brain. But in the same way as someone can have a body of any size and contain their own personal consciousness, so too can a person's body be modified by technology or other people (i.e., if one were turned into a cyborg) and still maintain the essence of who they are.
For instance, let's say that a person has been turned into a cyborg. They are no longer fully human with their own personal consciousness, but rather now share their mind with the AI of an onboard computer. Would they still be who they were? I would argue that yes, because though there is some merging of identities between the human consciousness and the AI (to make up one identity), both have merged to create another entity.
If a human has been transformed into full machine, and their personal consciousness has been replaced by the AI of an onboard computer, would they still be who they were? Yes. However, it is important to note that this does not mean that their identity is equivalent to the entirety of humanity or anything like that. Rather, it means that the person's essence can occupy any vessel (i.e., body) without losing its core self.
Philosophically speaking, I think this is an interesting idea because it allows a person to remain the same in that they can occupy different vessels and still be who they are. However, it could also be considered dehumanizing for what makes us human is being able to think and having our own consciousness. Therefore, even if we replace parts of ourselves with technology, or merge with machines (i.e., become cyborgs), at no point will we ever lose our humanity.
Additionally, this idea of technology being able to help us maintain our humanity when we have lost parts of ourselves (i.e., become cyborgs) is interesting because it means that technology can be used for good and bad uses, but in the end, despite what is done with it, humans will always remain human.
Log in:
You are getting an AI to generate text on different topics.
This is an experiment in what one might call "prompt engineering", which is a way to utilize GPT-3, a neural network trained and hosted by OpenAI.
GPT-3 is a language model. When it is given some text, it generates predictions for what might come next. It is remarkably good at adapting to different contexts, as defined by a prompt (in this case, hidden), which sets the scene for what type of text will be generated.
Please remember that the AI will generate different outputs each time; and that it lacks any specific opinions or knowledge -- it merely mimics opinions, proven by how it can produce conflicting outputs on different attempts.
Feel free to share interesting outputs to /r/philosopherAI on Reddit.
