Can machines think?

Can machines think?

The question whether a machine can think, understand, reason and learn, is not so simple. It purely depends on how we define the term “thinking”.

This category is about whether or not computers, robots, and software agents can literally be said to think.  Humans think, chimps think, dogs think, cats and birds think. But do computers?  Is your computer thinking now?  Perhaps only specially programmed computers think?  Or perhaps only computers with special hardware can think -- hardware that resembles the neurons of the brain, for example. If computers can be made to think, then does that mean that humans are a kind of robot and their brains a kind of computer -- a neurocomputer, say?  One of the deeper issues here is that the term "thinking" is ambiguous in at least two ways: It can include being conscious of one's environment (surroundings), one's personal feelings and thoughts, etc., or it can mean cogitate, learn, plan, and solve problems, where these latter terms pick out mental events that may or may not be conscious. According to the second definition of thinking, yes machines can think. But if we consider the first one as machine can have feelings and thoughts then surely no, machines can’t think like humans. It all depends on the context in which we are talking about thinking.