To ascribe certain beliefs, knowledge, free will, intentions, consciousness, abilities or wants to a machine or computer program is legitimate when such
an ascription expresses the same information about the machine that it expresses about a person. It is useful when the ascription helps us understand
the structure of the machine, its past or future behavior, or how to repair
or improve it. It is perhaps never logically required even for humans, but
expressing reasonably briefly what is actually known about the state of a
machine in a particular situation may require ascribing mental qualities or qualities isomorphic to them.