Our Machines, Ourselves: About computers, chess, clones, and human anxiety

The rematch between world chess champion Garry Kasparov and IBM's "Deep Blue" (and a team of programmers) provides the focus for a discussion of the meaning of intelligence, humanity, and consciousness. The conversation involves a Harper's editor (Hitt), the author of "After Thought: The Computer Challenge to Human Intelligence" (Bailey), a Yale Professor of computer science (Gelertner), a computer scientist-artist (Lanier), and a poet and journalist (Siebert). I also recommend that you look at the IBM Web site that reports developments at the match, that began May 3.