Is it wrong to pray for God to make me more successful so that I can be more humble? - Robert J. Marks II

Those who believe in the coming of Strong AI argue that non-algorithmic consciousness will be an emergent property as AI complexity ever increases. In other words, consciousness will just happen, as a sort of natural outgrowth of the code’s increasing complexity. Such unfounded optimism is akin to that of a naive young boy standing in front of a large pile of horse manure. He becomes excited and begins digging into the pile, flinging handfuls of manure over his shoulders. “With all this horse poop,” he says, “there must be a pony in here somewhere!” Strong AI proponents similarly claim, in essence, “With all this computational complexity, there must be some consciousness here somewhere!”

Turning a soul into an algorithm is pure nonsense.

[N]on-algorithmic computing in digital silicon is an oxymoron.