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Personal Identity

Androids

(Text as at 10/04/2017 23:38:24)

(For earlier versions of this Note, see the table at the end)

Plug Note₁

• Briefly, an Android (see Wikipedia: Link) is – or would be were one to be built – robot with no organic parts that looks and acts like a human being.
  • The Android needs to behave as if it had an appropriate psychology – at least one that passes the Turing Test.
  • This psychology need not involve phenomenal consciousness – indeed it is one of the problems of philosophy to consider how we could ever know whether or not an android is phenomenally conscious.
  • Could it not be a zombie²? See the entry in Wikipedia (Link).
  • Compare and contrast with Cyborgs³.
• The relevance of Androids to the topic of Personal Identity stems from whether or not Androids would be persons⁴.
  • On the presumption that they might be, then the question arises whether a human person⁵ might metamorphose⁶ into an android by a process of siliconisation⁷ (and cyborgisation – for the non-psychological elements).
  • On the presumption that an android cannot be identical to a human animal, this TE⁸ seems to pull apart animal identity and personal identity.
• A reading list (where not covered elsewhere) might start with:-
  1. "Churchland (Paul) & Churchland (Patricia) - Could a Machine Think?", Churchland, 1990
  2. "Grossman (Lev) - 2045: The Year Man Becomes Immortal", Grossman, 2011
  3. "Kaess (Genevieve) - Could Consciousness Emerge from a Machine Language?", Kaess, 2011
  4. "Leiber (Justin) - Can Animals and Machines Be Persons? : A Dialogue", Leiber, 1985
  5. "Pollock (John L.) - How to Build a Person: A Prolegomenon", Pollock, 1989
  6. "Putnam (Hilary) - Robots: Machines or Artificially Created Life?", Putnam, 1964
• This is mostly a place-holder⁹. Currently, just see the categorised reading-list.

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In-Page Footnotes:

Footnote 1:

• A number of my philosophical Notes are “promissory notes” currently only listing the books and papers (if any) I possess on the topic concerned.
• I’ve decided to add some text – whether by way of motivation, or something more substantive – for all these identified topics related to my Thesis.
• As I want to do this fairly quickly, the text may be confused or show surprising ignorance.
• The reader (if such exists) will have to bear with me, and display the principle of charity while this footnote exists.

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Printable Versions:

• Follow (this link) for level 0 (with reading list), and
• Follow (this link) for level 0, and
• Follow (this link) for level 1.

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Table of the Previous 3 Versions of this Note:

Date	Length	Title
18/12/2010 19:58:05	1072	Androids
18/08/2009 20:39:50	929	Androids
12/08/2007 10:17:46	230	Androids

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Note last updated	Reading List for this Topic	Parent Topic
10/04/2017 23:38:24	Androids	Cyborgs

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Summary of Note Links from this Page

Awaiting Attention (Personal Identity)	Cyborgs	Human Persons	Metamorphosis	Person
Siliconisation	Thought Experiments	Zombies

To access information, click on one of the links in the table above.

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Summary of Note Links to this Page

Bodily Continuity

Cyborgs

Non-Human Persons

Thisness (Haecceity)

Transhumanism

To access information, click on one of the links in the table above.

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Authors, Books & Papers Citing this Note

Author	Title	Medium	Extra Links	Read?
Papineau (David)	Introducing Consciousness	Paper		Yes
Todman (Theo)	Thesis - Androids	Paper		Yes
Todman (Theo)	Thesis - Bodily Continuity	Paper		Yes
Todman (Theo)	Thesis - Cyborgs	Paper		Yes
Todman (Theo)	Thesis - Non-Human Persons	Paper		Yes
Todman (Theo)	Thesis - Thisness (Haecceity)	Paper		Yes
Todman (Theo)	Thesis - Transhumanism	Paper		Yes

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References & Reading List

Author	Title	Medium	Source	Read?
Churchland (Paul) & Churchland (Patricia)	Could a Machine Think?	Paper - Cited	Scientific American, January 1990	No
Churchland (Paul) & Churchland (Patricia)	On the Contrary: Critical Essays, 1987 - 1997	Book - Cited (via Paper Cited)	Bibliographical details to be supplied	No
Floridi (Luciano)	Should we be afraid of AI?	Paper - By Subtopic	Aeon, 09 May, 2016	Yes
Grossman (Lev)	2045: The Year Man Becomes Immortal	Paper - Cited	Time Magazine, February 21, 2011	Yes
Hains (Brigid) & Hains (Paul)	Aeon: C-F	Book - By Subtopic (via Paper By Subtopic)	Hains (Brigid) & Hains (Paul) - Aeon: C-F	30%
Hains (Brigid) & Hains (Paul)	Aeon: Q-S	Book - By Subtopic (via Paper By Subtopic)	Hains (Brigid) & Hains (Paul) - Aeon: Q-S	28%
Kaess (Genevieve)	Could Consciousness Emerge from a Machine Language?	Paper - Cited	Macalester Journal of Philosophy: Vol. 20: Iss. 1, 2011, Article 8	No
Leiber (Justin)	Can Animals and Machines Be Persons? : A Dialogue	Book - Cited	Leiber (Justin) - Can Animals and Machines Be Persons? : A Dialogue	No
Leiber (Justin)	Can Animals and Machines Be Persons? : Introduction, Setting, Notes & Reading List	Paper - By Subtopic		No
Paul (Ellen), Miller (Fred) & Paul (Jeffrey), Eds.	Personal Identity	Book - By Subtopic (via Paper By Subtopic)	Paul (Ellen), Miller (Fred) & Paul (Jeffrey), Eds. - Personal Identity	0%
Pollock (John L.)	Cognitive Carpentry	Paper - By Subtopic	Pollock - How to Build a Person, Chapter 6	No
Pollock (John L.)	How to Build a Person: A Prolegomenon	Book - Cited	Pollock (John L.) - How to Build a Person: A Prolegomenon	6%
Pollock (John L.)	The Language of Thought	Paper - By Subtopic	Pollock - How to Build a Person, Chapter 5	No
Putnam (Hilary)	Philosophical Papers 2 - Mind, Language and Reality	Book - Cited (via Paper Cited)	Bibliographical details to be supplied	No
Putnam (Hilary)	Robots: Machines or Artificially Created Life?	Paper - Cited	Journal of Philosophy, Vol. 61, No. 21, (Nov. 12, 1964), pp. 668-691	No
Rini (Regina)	Raising good robots	Paper - By Subtopic	Aeon, 18 April, 2017	Yes
Robinson (Guy)	How to Tell Your Friends From Machines	Paper - By Subtopic	Mind, 1972, 504-518	No
Shanahan (Murray)	Conscious exotica	Paper - By Subtopic	Aeon, 19 October, 2016	Yes
Shapiro (Michael)	The Identity of Identity: Moral and Legal Aspects of Technological Self-Transformation	Paper - By Subtopic	Paul, Miller & Paul - Personal Identity, 2005	No
Todman (Theo)	Thesis - Androids	Paper - By Subtopic		Yes

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Text Colour Conventions

1. Black: Printable Text by me; © Theo Todman, 2018
2. Blue: Text by me; © Theo Todman, 2018
3. Mauve: Text by correspondent(s) or other author(s); © the author(s)

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