Originally Posted By: quick_joey_small
I can tell you exactly when computers will get self awareness: never.
They don't have minds. A computer is a lot of switches that can be on or off and that's all they are. Ask any computer bod. They are as able to think, as a big box of light switches is able to become the terminator. Artificial Intelligence doesn't exist. They can only pretend to have ideas by saying what a human being has told them to.


What I haven't figured out is what makes sentience. I know I have a brain (at least allegedly) and my mind is the software that runs on that hardware (see above), but I cannot explain how my cerebral cortex, or some other part or combination of parts of my brain allows sentience to happen.

Computers as they are now do not have minds and even the very best Turing Test-passing AI cannot be said to be sentient. Until we figure out what makes humans sentient it strikes me as being unlikely that we'll be able to create sentient computers.