In this blog post, I’ll examine whether machines can possess a self and mind like humans—through the artificial intelligence and cyborgs featured in the movie ‘Ghost in the Shell’—and consider how the intentionality of artificial intelligence differs from human emotions.
The movie ‘Ghost in the Shell’ depicts a future where technological advancements have led to the network dominating the world, and where humans and cyborgs coexist due to advanced cyborg technology. The protagonist, Kusanagi, is a cyborg assigned to Public Security Section 9, which carries out counterterrorism missions both on the network and in the real world. Their most urgent mission is to locate and eliminate the hacker known as “Puppet Master,” who has infiltrated the network and is causing trouble. However, the Puppet Master they discovered did not exist in human form but existed as a program within the network. As the project progressed, a program with a sense of self formed on its own, and the Puppet Master thus created sought to find its own identity. Declaring, “As a living being, I seek political asylum,” it wished to be recognized as a living being despite being a program. Observing this, Major Kusanagi felt compassion for the Puppet Master, whose plight—struggling to distinguish between human and machine—mirrored her own as a cyborg. The Puppet Master evaded attempts to eliminate it by entering a cybernetic body and fought to avoid being destroyed. Major Kusanagi, following orders, engaged the Puppet Master in combat, waging a life-or-death battle. After the fight ended, Kusanagi gradually came to understand the Puppet Master’s perspective and eventually connected with and merged into the Puppet Master’s network, reborn as a new life form possessing the selves of a human, a machine, and the network. In his book ‘The End of Ownership’, Jeremy Rifkin states: “I connect, therefore I am.” Simply put, the “connection” referred to here is the opposite of ownership. While ownership implies permanence, connection is fleeting. In the information age, people are already accustomed to this mode of connection. They access news temporarily via the internet as needed and can communicate with others instantly at any time through their smartphones. The cyborgs of Public Security Section 9 in the movie ‘Ghost in the Shell’ are no exception. The cyborgs of Public Security Section 9, whose bodies—or parts thereof—have been replaced with artificial bodies, possess modified brains known as “cyberbrains.” They connect a cable to a plug at the back of their necks to access a computer and receive the information they need. This scenario is already emerging in reality and is likely to become even more prevalent in the future. One might think that a world is not far off where everyone shares the same information and acts in a uniform manner based on that information. Downloading necessary information through a single massive network and, when the body breaks down, restoring previous memory data to the brain to continue living represents a new form of existence distinct from that of humans as we know them. Through this film, I reflected deeply on whether cyborgs of this kind should be recognized as living beings with their own sense of self.
The most striking scene in the film is when the Puppet Master—formed from the vast network—declares, “As a living being, I seek political asylum.” Should we truly recognize the Puppet Master, a monstrosity born of the network, as a being with a self, just like a human?
I intend to approach and address this issue from the perspective of cognitive science. The question, “Do machines have minds?” has long been a subject of endless debate. Similar to the movie ‘Ghost in the Shell’, can a machine created with artificial intelligence possess a mind?
A man named Turing conducted an experiment to determine whether a machine possessed intelligence through a test. The test involved assessing how closely a machine could mimic human conversation; through this experiment, Turing demonstrated that, in terms of input data and corresponding output data, a machine could perform some human functions. Next, John Searle took this a step further and demonstrated the limitations of the Turing test. He used the “Chinese Room” thought experiment to prove his point: this is an experiment in which a person who does not speak Chinese enters a room, is asked a question in Chinese, and responds in Chinese using prepared Chinese language materials. This demonstrates that even someone who does not know Chinese can speak the language as long as they have access to a vast amount of data—suggesting the possibility that a machine, too, could respond and behave like a human if it possessed a large volume of data. However, the Turing Test cannot distinguish this “Chinese Room” scenario. Some cognitive scientists, observing this, argued that highly intelligent programs possess a mind similar to that of humans. However, this claim is refuted by the emergence of a new term: “intentionality.” Simply put, intentionality refers to the process by which human consciousness assigns meaning to objects through internal exploration. It is a concept similar to “Ghost” (identity) as depicted in ‘Ghost in the Shell’, and it is also related to the “self” discussed by Descartes and Hume. In other words, the meaning of an object can be interpreted differently depending on the direction in which human consciousness is oriented. For example, Snow White might perceive an apple as poisonous, while I might perceive it as a fruit rich in vitamins. This phenomenon arises from a difference in intentionality. Intentionality prompts us to consider why machines might feel a little closer to humans. So, can we say that highly programmed machines, like the Puppet Master in ‘Ghost in the Shell’, possess intentionality? Let’s apply the above concepts to this question. Some cognitive scientists argue that, in John Searle’s “Chinese Room” thought experiment, if there were a robot that looked and acted like a human, we could judge that the robot possesses a human mind. This depends on whether or not we attribute intentionality to the machine. For example, consider a person who buys flowers and gifts to express their feelings to someone they like. There is also a machine that mimics this behavior by buying flowers and gifts for a romantic interest. Does this machine truly possess the intentionality of liking that person and act accordingly? Clearly, that is not the case. It is difficult to attribute the meaning of intentionality to a machine based solely on its imitation of behavior. Through the studies mentioned above, I was able to arrive at an answer to this question. Should we acknowledge the “puppeteers”—these aberrations of the network—as possessing a self-awareness like that of humans? My final answer is, “They are not human.” While it may be possible to make value judgments or assess situations like a human using vast amounts of data, can a puppet master truly feel and judge the nuances of emotion that even humans struggle to express in words? Can it understand the extent to which I like and love a certain person, feel anger and sadness when witnessing social evils, or feel sorrow and heartache upon hearing bad news? This brings us back to the issue of intentionality. While internal experiences and consciousness give rise to diverse expressions, we arrive at a contradiction: even if a puppet master is programmed with vast amounts of data to simply “feel sad” or “feel happy,” it cannot know or prove the exact degree of that sadness or joy. In other words, the nuances of emotion—which even humans cannot fully explain in words—cannot be quantified as data. In this regard, it is impossible for a puppet master to distinguish between the full range of human emotions. Furthermore, throughout human history, people have developed a sense of belonging and connection to one another, along with the myriad emotions that have grown from these bonds. While this naturally stems from the instinct to maintain human superiority, it is likely to hold true when humans encounter the advancement of AI machines like the puppet master. Problems arise the moment humans, upon the initial emergence of AI machines, recognize them as such rather than as human beings with equal personhood. Rather than feeling human emotions toward AI machines, humans will feel a sense of alienation, and in the process, the machines—driven by highly advanced programs—will accumulate vast amounts of data regarding how humans treat them. As a result, data confirming that they are different from humans will accumulate; if such data is included within this vast dataset, my prediction is that they will ultimately be unable to possess a mind like that of a human. Consequently, as depicted in ‘Ghost in the Shell’, it is difficult for AI machines to exist with a human-like sense of self. Even if they did exist, I believe they would be classified as entities distinct from humans.
