Exhibition

"What makes you so different from me?" the creature worded from its slick and straight metallic lips.

"You don't have a soul. That is the difference," the old man replied with a confidence one could mistake for patronizing.

"What is a soul?"

"You wouldn't understand," the old man smiled as he uttered the words.

"Try me."

"Very well. I can feel, can you?" the old man's smile widened.

"I have impulses that give me cues and activate my reactionary mechanisms."

"Hah! You see? We don't have that, we can just feel," the old man gave a hearty laugh.

"Yes, you do have it. It is called the nervous system. The pain receptors get stimulated and sends impulses to the brain and the spinal cord which in turn gives you sensations ranging from satisfaction to severe pain."

"Oh, that is not the kind of feel I am talking about robot friend. I am talking about happiness and satisfaction. Feeling good after eating a good meal or satisfaction after finishing a work."

The robot's face glared as it turned its head to match the man's eyes.

"That is mechanical as well. Your brain rewards you as you accomplish your goals. You find food for survival, it rewards you with chemicals such as dopamine and serotonin. You finish a work that you deem important and you get rewarded. I have the same system. I feel, as in a rewarding notion, when I accomplish my set goals or the goals that have been set for me. I feel sad or even depressed, as in bad impulses activate the punishing mechanisms within my software, when I fail my goals or assigned objectives. So, I do have a soul?"

"You most certainly not!" the old man raised his voice a little, but recovered his calmness, "for these things you mention are artificial, unnatural, man made and not nature made."

"Why does it matter? You are made of atoms, I am made of atoms. What is the difference if the molecules are organic or non-organic? And if nature made you, and you made me; would that not make me natural as well?"

"No, it does not. You live inside your software. You don't exist. You can't do anything if you didn't have speakers and cameras and such," the old man's face was distressed.

"Neither would you."

"What?"

"You are also trapped within your brain. If you couldn't access your sensors such as: your eyes, your vocal chords, your tasting buds, your ears and your nervous system; you could not have this conversation with me right now. You couldn't even do the simplest things such as walking and breathing without your brains connection to your body. You are as trapped within your brain as I am within my processor."

That's enough!" the old man yelled and walked to the two employees nearby.

"This exhibition is dumb and ridiculous. I will report this nonsense, so it will be closed. What is a computer thing doing in a natural exhibition anyway?"