Many of the furious attempts to argue why machines—nonbiological systems—cannot ever possibly compare to humans appear to be fueled by this basic reaction of incredulity. The history of human thought is marked by many attempts to refuse to accept ideas that seem to threaten the accepted view that our species is special. Copernicus’s insight that the Earth was not at the center of the universe was resisted, as was Darwin’s that we were only slightly evolved from other primates. The notion that machines could match and even exceed human intelligence appears to challenge human status once again.
...more
