Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google parent company Alphabet, has said  that artificial intelligence (AI) could have a more profound effect on humanity than fire and electricity.   Quite a statement. New AI technologies are being produced, Including ChatGPT, that are conversational and can write better and communicate more clearly than most people.  And they provide fast, almost immediate, answers to any question.  While it is has not yet been perfected, and flaws have been noticed, the question has been raised as to whether such programs can self-learn on their own, and program themselves.  And importantly, when fully developed, whether they should be considered conscious entities.  Like a human being.    There seems to be two camps here. One group believes that it AI is just an algorithm at the end of day, and does not possess anything beyond the information and formulas put into it by the programmers.  The other group feels we are on the verge of a creating a digital super intelligence, a digital god.  What has philosophy and psychology to say about this?  This episode explores.  Support the show