p The world is witnessing the rapid development of a new science, cybernetics which studies various control systems and control process, and has created some remarkable machines. Some of them guide trains, aircraft or intricate production processes, others translate texts from one language into another, still others perform logical operations, extremely complex mathematical calculations, etc. These machines can be fed information, “memorise” and process it and perform useful functions. In some respects these machines surpass man: for instance, they perform calculations hundreds of thousands of times faster than man, study a vast amount of data, analyse a mass of variants, and so forth. Machines are being designed which will be able to perfect the programme of their work and even improve its own structure on the basis of preceding activity. A machine can operate where man cannot work either due to danger (for instance in places where atomic and other harmful processes take place), or inaccessibility (remote outer space).

p The progress of cybernetics has given grounds to ascribe to automatic machines the ability to experience sensations and even to think. Moreover, there is talk that it is possible to develop an automatic machine whose intellectual capacity will enable it to surpass, and, in the final count, to replace man. It is claimed that the era of robots will replace the era of mankind.

p In reality, even the most perfect machine cannot experience sensations, let alone think. A machine does not think, it merely imitates or models certain logical functions inherent in man, and only those of them which can be formalised or mathematically processed. The fact that as science progresses the range of thinking operations which can be formalised broadens does not change the essence of matter: man and man alone is capable of thought, which is a property of the brain as a specially organised matter, a product 62 of the prolonged evolution of the material world and, above all, of the social environment. Thought is social in nature, while a machine, no matter how perfect, has been and will always be a lifeless mechanism created and controlled by man.

p Man singles himself out from nature, he actively cognises the surrounding world, and influences and transforms it. He possesses inexhaustible creative powers and an amazingly profound and broad range of sensations, thoughts, emotions, interests, etc. The machine is deprived of all this. It is the product of the astute mind and skilled hands of man who programmes its functions no matter how difficult or amazing they may be.

p Just as an ordinary machine facilitates man’s physical efforts, the cybernetic machine facilitates his mental efforts, freeing his mind from the need to perform tiring, monotonous and uncreative operations, and broadens his intellectual abilities. But however high the level which cybernetics may attain in its development, an automatic machine will never become a vehicle of human consciousness and will never replace man as a social being. It will always remain an instrument, a means of solving production and cognitive problems confronting mankind.

Now let us examine the origin and development of consciousness.