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Chapter 3 – The Mind: Substance Dualism of Descartes

Chapter 3 Prompt

The Mind of Descartes or The Mind of AI

“I think, therefore I am.”  Also known as Cogito Ergo Sum, and usually referred to as Cartesian Dualism. The Mind-Body Problem.

This epistemological question is one that everyone has asked themselves at some point: How do I know what I know? How do I know I exist?  As you’ve read this chapter, Descartes developed this revolutionary 17th-century philosophical thinking from a time when the concept of “God” was the sole explanation for our existence. Think about the world today. How have our explanations for our existence changed since Descartes?

Now, think about AI in relation to Descartes’s “I think, therefore I am.” When you think about artificial intelligence, what happens when AI asks this epistemological question? Can AI ask this question of itself? Or are we as human beings simply using AI to hide behind?

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