Congratulations to our senior debating team who achieved maximum marks in round two of the Rotary ‘Youth Debates’ competition on Thursday February 9th .
The team debated whether it would ever be possible for a machine to think like a human. SM chaired the argument with humour and aplomb, whilst LL argued that ‘strong AI’ would never be possible, backing his argument skilfully with references from science and philosophy. Taking the opposite view, MP suggested if a machine appeared to think like us, that would be enough, since that is the standard we apply to other humans.
Our debaters were up against an equally impressive team of young students from Duke of Kent School in Surrey, who were also interested in discussing technology, debating the notion that overall
IT was causing more harm than good. The rotary judging panel declared it was the hardest decision they had ever had to make, suggesting in the end that both teams go through to round three in Dorking in March.
Congratulations to the excellent debaters – I’m sure Mr de Souza has not fully done justice to the complexity of their arguments here! Good luck for round 3.