Gaming

Cory brings up a certainly interesting point that seems to weave through these three texts and through most of philosophy: it's exceedingly difficult to prove that things are the way we believe them to be. Descartes can declare "Cogito ergo sum", but really, it's quite impossible to comprehend exactly how and why it is that we exist. However, these large declarations aside, Heinlein is one very tricky little man. His diction is very drawn out and maddening, as if to match the style of our hero's rationalization that he is in fact under the control of the aliens. The conclusion wasn't all that surprising, it's become cliche, but I was especially intrigued by the fact that he was a chess player. Frequently, pieces that deal with large abstracts such as existentialism use human designed games, which seem to have a greater sense of control, as a vehicle for their major claims. Heinlein uses chess. Darren Aronofsky used Go in the film Pi. Though the two sources deal with relatively different topics (well, that's debatable...) existence and chaos, I found it interesting how both implicated very complicated games with seemingly endless moves and methods of play. Perhaps this is a logical parallel to either the infinite complexities of being alive, or in the case of the film, actual chaos. However, there is one quality that unites both the motif of complex games and our packet on skeptic writers: Asimov's claim on complexity.

Asimov asserts through his certainly less-than-adorable robot Cutie that we are incapable of creating beings of higher complexity and power than our own. This referred me once again to chess or the game of Go, because to comprehend that a human being created a game of such depth and complexity is almost frightening. In fact, looking at all creation by all people over time is a very frightening experience. We have come such a long way, we believe, in technological, artistic, cultural, and mental development. However, we're really uncertain of its source origin, or at an even simpler level, whether or not it actually exists. Cutie explains we cannot be creators, only assemblers of robots, because of their inherent superiority to humans. Have we really created great new things over time, or are we just putting good pieces and ideas together? Another thought that occurred to me was that perhaps human beings may be inferior to the physical capabilities of a robot, but are not our mental capacities equal or greater than our robotic pals? It's a hard question to expect an answer to because, well, these robots really don't exist. No, seriously!

A final parting thought: what specifically is meant between the distinctions of the words "create" and "make"? It's an important distinction, I believe, and everyone knows philosophy lacks some concrete definitions.