It's a fun/interesting device in science fiction, just like the concept of golems (animated beings) are in folk tales. But it's complete nonsense to talk about it as a possibility in the real world so yes, the label of 'machine learning' is a far, far better label to use for this powerful and interesting domain.
> The creation of consciousness is impossible.
That's where I'd start my argument.
Machines can 'learn', given iterative training and some form of memory but they can not think nor understand. That requires consciousness, and the idea that consciousness can be emergent (which it is my understanding that the 'AI' argument rests upon), has never been shown. It is an unproven fantasy.
In my view, and in the view of major religions (Hinduism, Buddhism, etc) plus various philosophers, consciousness is eternal and the only real thing in the universe. All else is illusion.
You don't have to accept that view but you do have to prove that consciousness can be created. An 'existence proof' is not sufficient because existence does not necessarily imply creation.
1. People have different kinds of conscious experience (just talk to other humans to get the picture).
2. Consciousness varies, and can be present or not-present at any given moment (sleep, death, hallucinogenic drugs, anaesthesia).
3. Many things don't have the properties of consciousness that I attribute to my subjective experience (rocks, maybe lifeforms that don't have nerve cells, lots of unknowns here).
Given this, it's obvious that consciousness can be created from non-consciousness, you need merely to have sex and wait 9 months. Add to that the fact that humans weren't a thing a million years ago, for instance, and you have to conclude that it's possible for an optimisation system to produce consciousness eventually (natural selection).
I think pragmatic thinking, not metaphysics, is what will ultimately lead to progress in AI. You haven't engaged with the actual content of my arguments at all - from that perspective, who's the one talking about fantasies really?
Edit: in case I give the mistaken impression that I'm angry - I'm not, thank you for your time. I find it very useful to talk to people with radically different world views to me.
Quite obviously not true (and also untrue in a documented sense in that many great scientists have not been materialists). Science is a method, not a philosophical view of the world.
> it comes from interacting with the world as it is
That the world is materialistic is unproven (and not possible to prove).
You are simply propounding a materialist philosophy here. As I've said before, it's fine to have that philosophy. It's not fine to dogmatically push that view as 'reality' and then extend on that to build and push fantasies about 'artificial intelligence'. Again, we avoid all of this philosophical debate if we simply stick to the term 'machine learning'.
Particularly with Hinduism, its embrace of various philosophies is very broad and includes strains of Materialism, which appears to be the other person's viewpoint, so again, I should have been more careful with my wording.
I would define thinking as the ability to evaluate propositions and evidence and arrive at some potentially useful plan or hypothesis.
I see no reason why a machine could not do this, but without any awareness ("consciousness") of itself doing it.
I also see no fundamental obstacle to true machine awareness either, but given your other responses, we can just disagree on that.
Thinking, understanding, self-aware, awake, integrated sensory stream, alive, emotional, visual, sensory, autonomy, adaptiveness, etc.
And machines can't learn.