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    The Robot's Rebellion: Finding Meaning in the Age of Darwin
    The Robot's Rebellion: Finding Meaning in the Age of Darwin
    The Robot's Rebellion: Finding Meaning in the Age of Darwin
    Ebook359 pages9 hours

    The Robot's Rebellion: Finding Meaning in the Age of Darwin

    By Keith E. Stanovich

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    The idea that we might be robots is no longer the stuff of science fiction; decades of research in evolutionary biology and cognitive science have led many esteemed scientists to the conclusion that, according to the precepts of universal Darwinism, humans are merely the hosts for two replicators (genes and memes) that have no interest in us except as conduits for replication. Richard Dawkins, for example, jolted us into realizing that we are just survival mechanisms for our own genes, sophisticated robots in service of huge colonies of replicators to whom concepts of rationality, intelligence, agency, and even the human soul are irrelevant.

    Accepting and now forcefully responding to this decentering and disturbing idea, Keith Stanovich here provides the tools for the "robot's rebellion," a program of cognitive reform necessary to advance human interests over the limited interest of the replicators and define our own autonomous goals as individual human beings. He shows how concepts of rational thinking from cognitive science interact with the logic of evolution to create opportunities for humans to structure their behavior to serve their own ends. These evaluative activities of the brain, he argues, fulfill the need that we have to ascribe significance to human life.

    We may well be robots, but we are the only robots who have discovered that fact. Only by recognizing ourselves as such, argues Stanovich, can we begin to construct a concept of self based on what is truly singular about humans: that they gain control of their lives in a way unique among life forms on Earth—through rational self-determination.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherUniversity of Chicago Press
    Release dateOct 15, 2010
    ISBN9780226771199
    The Robot's Rebellion: Finding Meaning in the Age of Darwin

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      Stanovich's book is based around the presumption that our body is built by replicators and our minds are flooded with them (genes and memes respectively) and that these replicators don't always necessarilly have our best interests at heart. He argues for what he calls a "program of cognitive reform" that places man, not his genes or memes, at the center stage. He argues that we need to rationally analyze our thoughts and motivations to see which fall in line with what we truly want out of life, and which are either created by our genes or motivated by our memes. He argues for epistemic rationality so that humans no longer fall prey to the replicators that would so willingly throw them away. Stanovich convincingly lays out the challenges facing humanity from within and makes clear that man is not so rational or enlightened as we might like.

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