Throughout the time that I was participated in the Minds and Machines classes, the
question that I enjoyed thinking about most was: who am I? Am “I” my body, or am “I” my
mind? Or, am I something even more, my devices, the stuff that I have been using? And the
robot that my team built, is it part of them? An extent of them or us?
When I was introduced with the question, I thought how I define “me” first. When I
was thinking about myself, I was mainly thinking about the features that my mind has, rather
than my body. I was defining myself based on my intellectual features rather than saying, a
short, dark hair guy. This realization made me think that, “I” means my mind. My body is just
a medium, through which my mind expresses itself. Just like a system that was coded, it
could function in anybody else’s body as it is, if it was possible to transport it.
This view has changed in couple of days, after I have started to have stomach
problems. My mind was affected greatly of the changes in my body. Then there come
another moment of realization and iteration. Maybe, my mind was part of “I” but the body
had also some share in it. Rather than being just the medium, my body was part of the
message as well. It had great impact on building my perception. Because I was short, for
example, I had to find quick solutions during my daily life and this made me a quick thinker
but at the same time gave me the problem of being quick-tempered and hotheaded. My
mind would evolve very differently in a tall but maybe light skin body!
And now, I think every device that I use is actually some sort of part of my mind. I
simply delegate things around me to do my mind’s work. So, that thought leads me to a
point and make me think that even the stuff I own is part of me. So “I” does not only consist
mind and body but even the stuff that I own.
In light of such a thinking, I think “Flipper” the robot is part of everybody that has
taken part in the building process. Because this robot thinks like how its builders imagine it.
The qualities it owns are given to it by people. Now, this robot is part of these people. It
resembles their way of thinking, it has something from that people. It is like an external
colony of everybody’s mind, inside of a programming language. And as I said before, one of
the builders of the mind is also the body, and also the devices or stuff one use, touch, see or
experience. So it may not be blunt to say that, “Flipper” is a part and consequence of several
Is in our group.

Ali