Consciousness
Consciousness is a quality or state of being aware of anything within or beyond oneself. It describes notions like qualia, sentience, the ability to feel or experience emotions, subjectivity, and possessing a feeling of soul or selfhood. It is a mind-controlling system. Consciousness, according to Schneider and Velmans (5), is formed by anything known at a given instant, a familiar experience with which one may identify.
Identifying Awake Humans
Identifying awake humans necessitates the observation of a very distinct feature sometimes referred to as alertness. Despite the fact that the machines can imitate human behaviors they lack awareness, especially during the Turing test where they fail to realize whether they have passed the test or not. Regardless of their intelligence, if you consider the machines more closely you will realize the absence of the capacity to solve most of the problems as a self-aware intelligent human being because they lack the awareness continuum.
Consciousness and Machines
Consequently, this lack of awareness of what the machine seems to "know" or "think," is the best way to tell whether the people in your life are humans or machines. Granted, machines with the ability to imitate human behavior are not easy to come by but free will and consciousness would automatically alienate machines from a human being. Machines have no sense of reality; rather they are fancy lifeless objects. Another way of identifying humans from machines is through asking questions. Machines have the capacity to answer questions intelligently but are not self-aware. For instance, a computer may not realize whether the responses it has given are correct (Dickerson, 7). The Turing Test has the ability to measure the processing of information but not awareness. It illustrates the ability of a computer program to imitate human being dialogue. Therefore, I rarely rely on its results while considering whether the people in my life are human beings or not.
The Origin of Consciousness
Consciousness does not arise from the brain or the body, or from any physical cause. The situation is close to a simulation, virtual reality or a dream. Further, Humans' existence is virtual reality. Virtual reality is a medium for knowledge that all mechanical devices lack, recognizing awareness is fundamental to knowing whether the person you are relating to is a human or a machine.
Psychological Test for Detecting Consciousness
Describe a psychological test that can detect consciousness in another being.
Consciousness in another being can be detected successfully by a tool called psychological assessment or psychological test. The psychological conditions used to measure these specific constructs of psychology in an individual include anxiety, depression and traits like extroversion, aptitude, achievement and intelligence. Everyone can administer psychology test, as long as they meet the requirements professionally (Bugental, Pierson, and Schneider 61-62). Psychological tests give a way of accurately and formally measuring factors of different kinds that can contribute to problems of the people. When the mental test is administered to someone, first an interview is conducted then more than one psychological test may be done in a given settings.
The types of psychological tests administered to detect consciousness in another being are Stanford, Wechsler for children and Wechsler for adults' intelligence skills. The personality tests measure traits and style. They are mainly used for clinical purposes for diagnosis and research. For instance, the tests include Rorschach, Thematic Apperception, and Minnesota Multiphasic personality tests. Attitude personality tests are used to measure the feelings of an individual about a given event, person, object or place like the scale of Likert. Achievements personality tests are used to measure the level of understanding of a given topic. Amplitude personality test is the measure of abilities of someone in a specific area.
Humanistic vs Mechanistic Model
Explain why psychology should adopt a humanistic or a mechanistic model, and what are the implications of each perspective for the field of psychology?
Humanistic psychology deals with the psychological perspective that took prominence in the middle of the 20th century in response to the theory of Sigmund Freud and Skinner's behaviorism. The theory stresses a process known as self-actualization which is the inherent drive by individuals towards expressing and realizing one's creativity and capabilities. Psychology should adopt the humanistic model because of its holistic approach that pays particular attention to free will, and the positive potential of human and creativity. It encourages self-exploration rather than the study of the people's behavior and to view ourselves as a whole sum of our part.
Another reason for adopting humanistic model is its acknowledgement of spiritual aspiration as part of the integration of the psyche. It is connected to the emerging field of psychology known as transpersonal therapy. The transpersonal therapy encourages mindfulness and self-awareness that helps one to change their state of behavior and mind from one set of response to a healthier one with better thoughtful actions and productive self-awareness. The mechanistic psychology is the belief that living things are similar to machines. The doctrine of mechanistic philosophy has two different flavors which have metaphysical principles, but with differences in ambitions and scope: the social theory about minds of humans and humans (Schneider et al, 12).
Notably, the mechanical model implies that machines can simulate human behavior using analog processes similar to the biological human systems. On the other hand, the humanistic approach allows the merging of behavioral therapy and mindfulness with the society, implying that the advances in psychology are driven by rational representation and the breakthroughs in human Psychology (Bugental, Pierson, and Schneider 61-62).
Personal Perspective
Which perspective (humanism or mechanism) do you favor, and how might your answer reflect your future career interests?
In my experience, the study of psychology is basically the study of ideas and arguments concerning timelessness in the reflection realm. With this in mind, adopting a humanistic point of view verses a mechanistic viewpoint is much preferred. The humanistic psychology perspective meets my needs because of the value placed on the subjective world of consciousness (Dickerson 27).The argument that free will places a limit on the ability to predict human behavior fascinates me and I find it true and believable. In contrast, dealing with humans that exhibit machine like qualities is lacks excitement especially because I do not believe the objective scientific psychology argument that lawful human behavior is predictable.
Consequently, my future career interests are geared towards helping people maximize their potential through positive energy. My focus would be on spiritual intuitions and creativity. This theoretical approach guided me to develop humanistic principles while working in a non-governmental humanitarian organization especially one that deals with rehab facilities or marriage counseling.
Relationship with an Automatic Sweetheart
Now that you know the truth about your sweetheart, could you still love him or her? Why or why not?
According to William James (5), an automatic sweetheart has no soul and is basically unconscious. Although he exhibits all the qualities of feminism I would not regard him as a full equivalent to human love. Simply by knowing that he lacks human consciousness would change my emotional feelings. My decision is influenced metaphysical essence that is beyond what is physical. My feelings would be entirely different towards an automatic sweetheart regardless of the observable similarities.
My deliberation is revitalized by the question about artificial intelligence. Machines cannot actually think; even the Turing test an influential imitation game is widely criticized. Particularly, a machine would fail to comprehend human intelligence despite the fact that it exhibits human qualities. The emotions displayed can be easily distinguished as imitative actions and a counterfeit will inherently be inferior to the human original. My feelings would change instantly because I would be unable to conceptualize intimacy and bonding with an automatic sweetheart.
References
Bugental, James F. T, J F. Pierson, and Kirk J. Schneider. The Handbook of Humanistic Psychology: Leading Edges in Theory, Research, and Practice. Thousand Oaks, Calif.: Sage Publ, 2001. Print.
Dickerson, Matthew T. The Mind and the Machine: What It Means to Be Human and Why It
Matters. 2016. Print.
Osborn, Matthew, and Harvey Ginsburg. “William James”Automatic Sweetheart’Revisited: Comparing Sternberg’s Love Measurements for Real versus Identical Android Sweethearts.” North American Journal of Psychology16.2 (2014): 383.
Schneider, Susan C, and Max Velmans. The Blackwell Companion to Consciousness. 2017.
Print.
