- published: 02 Aug 2006
- views: 291
The Emotion Machine: Commonsense Thinking, Artificial Intelligence, and the Future of the Human Mind is a 2006 book by cognitive scientist Marvin Minsky. The book is a sequel to Minsky's earlier book Society of Mind.
Minsky argues that emotions are different ways to think that our mind uses to increase our intelligence. He challenges the distinction between emotions and other kinds of thinking. His main argument is that emotions are "ways to think" for different "problem types" that exist in the world. The brain has rule-based mechanisms (selectors) that turns on emotions to deal with various problems. The book reviews the accomplishments of AI, what and why it is complicated to accomplish in terms of modeling how human beings behave, how they think, how they experience struggles and pleasures.
In a book review for The Washington Post, neurologist Richard Restak states that:
Minsky outlines the book as follows:
Emotion, perpetual emotion
Emotion, perpetual emotion
Emotion, perpetual emotion
Emotion, perpetual emotion
Oo, you got me going
I can't stop, I climb the highest mountain
To the top, I go through fire for you
Swim the ocean wild with this blind devotion
Mama say, mama say, there'll be days
You gonna meet someone and somehow
They are gonna take your heart and sail away
Set you in motion
Emotion, perpetual emotion
Emotion, perpetual emotion
Oo you do what you do, you do
Some kind of voodoo you
Call my name out low
And I come runnin' to you, you
Pull a string and set your puppet in motion
Love is the drug in your potion
So my love, I ask you to be kind
Though love is blind, my love, don't leave my love behind
These things you do, my love
You know they put me through
So please be true, my love
And I'll be true to you
I have lived and loved and I have learned that
Love can be so hot that love can burn
You give your love and love is not returned