The meaning of the problem: emotions and reasoning

Émile THALABARD, Associate professor, IPC, France

Descartes notoriously denied both animal and automaton intelligence – his main argument relied on the statement of a specifically human capacity to understand signs. Descartes also sketched a subtler argument in favor of an alleged specificity of human intelligence, based on the epistemic role of emotions ; the human mind is capable of framing problems in virtue of its capacity to undergo emotions such as wonder. Does allowing certain emotions to have epistemic value restrict it the scope of artificial intelligence ?