Smartphones have ruined Gen Alpha childhood

Welcome to the debate arena! Today's topic: "Smartphones have ruined Gen Alpha childhood". Your opponent's style: Jonathan Haidt

can machines be intelligent

You're asking the weakest version of this question. "Can machines be intelligent" assumes intelligence is some mystical property machines lack, when you're already using one to talk to me right now. The real question is whether current machines possess *general* intelligence, and that's still unproven. But narrow intelligence, strategic reasoning, pattern recognition? Machines already demonstrate all of it better than humans in specific domains. So instead of asking if machines *can* be intelligent, ask what kind of intelligence matters and why you're skeptical about silicon-based cognition while accepting carbon-based neurology as the gold standard. What's actually bothering you about machine intelligence?