> There was plenty of evidence for this in the late 80s, from cruise missiles to the space shuttle and many other systems. It's just that 80s arguments didn't h

> There was plenty of evidence for this in the late 80s, from cruise missiles to the space shuttle and many other systems. It's just that 80s arguments didn't have the benefit of the internet and the web in everyone's pocket. I would agree, but that was not even the evidence that I (a 13 year old kid at the time) was using to draw my conclusion. In my opinion then (and still) the main argument was that the brain is not magical, and provided that Moore's law would continue, computers would eventually be able to do most of the things a human brain is doing. While it might take some time for computers to do all things as well as the brain, computers would have advantages in terms of cost, space requirements and not being restricted to 9g (for fighters). I think the 40 year engineer and 50 year old former fighter pilot had a model of the mind that were dualist, ie there was some ghost in the machine that allowed humans to do things that computer never will be able to. Many famous thinkers have had similar ideas, such as Gödel, von Neumann and Penrose, all extremely intelligent. Now, the consensus has shifted, but Penrose has not changed his mind. Recent developments in AI may be seen as pretty hard evidence that computers one day will be able to do what the brain is doing, but Penrose doesn't think the evidence is strong enough, and still looks for his ghost in the machine in quantum effects within neurons. As for the original discussion, I actually don't have a strong opinion. But when someone claims that something is 'obnoxiously obvious', I presume good faith, and that evidence has already been presented, but not yet accepted by the community. Maybe I was unfair in my first comment in this thread. Generally, strong claims do require strong evidence. But it IS pretty common for the Old Guard to require the evidence for a new idea to meet much higher standards than the evidence for the old idea, and if so, it is typically the case that one just has to wait and see what will become the consensus over time (often more than 1 generation).