Page "Consciousness" Paragraph 21

The idea of an artifact made conscious is an ancient theme of mythology, appearing for example in the Greek myth of Pygmalion, who carved a statue that was magically brought to life, and in medieval Jewish stories of the Golem, a magically animated homunculus built of clay.

However, the possibility of actually constructing a conscious machine was probably first discussed by Ada Lovelace, in a set of notes written in 1842 about the Analytical Engine invented by Charles Babbage, a precursor ( never built ) to modern electronic computers.

Lovelace was essentially dismissive of the idea that a machine such as the Analytical Engine could think in a humanlike way.

She wrote: