Hi Day,
-> HW>    What do you make of Socrates' references to his daemon? The
-> Greeks had the idea of the 'Muse', which was not a god, or an angel,
-> but a rather impersonal robotic force with no motive; a
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-> kind of Murphy's law animator, and I see his daemon more in that way-
-> nothing devilish.
   I had nothing devilish in mind.
   In the Republic, at 90a, it says  "As regards the most important part
of our soul we must think this: that a god has given it as a spirit
(_daimon_) to each of us, that which we say dwells in the top part of
the body, to lift us
from the earth to its kindred in heaven, for we are not of earthly
but of divine nature.  "  quoted in Grube, _Plato's Thought_ p. 144.
   In the Symposium, 202e
   "A very powerful spirit, Socrates, and spirits, you know, are
halfways between god and man.   ...They are the envoys and interpreter
that ply between heaven and earth, flying upward with our worship
and prayers, and descending with the heavenly answers and commandments."
   _Collected Dialogues_  (Bollingen, 1961)
   See also the Timaeus at 41.
   This doesn't sound much like robots to me.
   Cheers.  Hal.
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