Consciousness should be no different, he argues. Some have
claimed that consciousness may only be possible in an organic brain. Dennett
concedes this may be true, but notes that science has already been able to
mechanically reproduce small-scale biochemical processes. An alternate counterargument
is that consciousness is simply too complex to be artificially replicated.
In response to this Dennett says that consciousness of a more basic form
may not require a sophisticated artificial substrate. Dennett ends by noting any
conscious machine will probably have to develop this capacity through an
extended learning process, just as humans do. From a practical standpoint this
is not a barrier, since a number of machines that learn from experience have
been designed.