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William lycan

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Why is the first premise of lycans argument that a computer driven robot could be constructed that has the same moral status as human beings debatable? what is lycans defense of it?

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Lycans is a functionalist; as such he reduces an object, in this case a human mind/human being, to what it says or does at a given point in time. A human being isn't conceived of as an organism that evolves and changes from the point of conception to death, with emotions and drives, but instead as a demonstration of intelligence and, perhaps, feeling, at a given point. It's a mistake to think of humanity, or preconditions of moral worth, in such narrow terms.
<br>1) "Computer driven robot": These terms connote a lack of sentience, as we're used to thinking of awkward mechanical responses, machine metal, and a lack of emotion. I think the problem is much more interesting, we're closer to the core issue, if we hypothesize, "suppose we were to create a ...

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