Story #62 - Thinking of a Mind
Finally, what the people were clamoring for: A sonnet about philosophy of mind in my best attempt at Iambic Pentameter.
I love strict verse. I love Shakespeare’s love sonnets, I love Edna St. Vincent Millay, I love Yeats and Byron and other purveyors of complicated rhyme schemes and clever phrasing and high-concept poems about abstract ideas. I don’t know too many poets who are working in these kinds of forms anymore, but I continue to work on them and adapt them for modern English as best I can. Hope you enjoy this one!
Thinking of a Mind
The new machines will not begin to think
They know but have no self to have a thought
Comprised only of knowledge held in sync
A string of facts tied tightly in a knot
My thoughts are mine: A creature separate
From thought itself, one that persists through time
And will not die if thinking should abate
Unlike the language model paradigm
Yet our electric minds are so fragile
Impact alone can oft amnesia cause
To fall asleep destroys our vulpine guile
And drugs to all our functions force a pause
The question is not could machines think too
The question is—why are you sure you do?
END
Thanks as always for reading! Have a great week, and I’ll be back next Sunday with something fun.
Enjoyed that, especially aloud!!
Short and sweet, with impact. And a new word for me - vulpine. 🤩