If new and improved A.I. tools can write your next essay, create Picasso-style art, or produce a believable deep-fake, it’s fair to ask: Are we manufacturing human brains?
In this episode, we dive into the complexity of the human brain — and what this means for morality, meaning, and purpose. You’ll hear from Dr. Rosalind Picard (MIT Media Lab) and Dr. Shahram Khoshbin (Harvard Medical School). This excerpt is from a Forum event at Harvard Medical School in 2016, and is moderated by Dr. Patrick Smith, a principal faculty member for the Initiative on Health, Religion, and Spirituality at Harvard Medical School.
When we think about human value, there's a tendency sometimes to think of it in terms of our parts. Your brain works well; somebody else may be missing half of their brain. Does that make them less valuable? Or my mom with Alzheimer's. Does that make her less valuable if dementia is setting in, if her memory doesn't work as well?
You are capable of creativity. It's amazing.
We need something outside of ourselves to tell us to get out of our comfort zone and go treat other people not only as equals, but to honor and respect them and think of them more highly than ourselves.
