The possibility of artificial sentience clearly relies on a functionalist viewpoint. A central assumption of this perspective is that conscious thought is not overlaid on a brain but rather is the very sensation generated by a particular kind of information processing. Whether that processing happens within a three-pound biological mass or within the circuits of a computer is irrelevant. The assumption could be wrong. Maybe a bundle of connections needs a substrate of wrinkled wet matter if it’s to gain self-awareness. Maybe you need the actual physical molecules that constitute a brain, not
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