I don't know what a "soul" is or even if there is such a thing but if you're asking if a computer program can have conscious experiences then my answer is no. The reason simply stated is that computations are abstract, conscious experiences are not and abstract things cannot produce non-abstract things.
Usually when people claim that a computer can be conscious they're claiming that consciousness is a possible property of the software that the computer is running, because that is where the non-trivial functionality is defined.
In your example if you think that the robot is conscious wouldn't it still be conscious if you replaced the "real world" with a simulation ?
I just have a vague awareness of my surroundings based on horribly inaccurate electrochemical data and a memory-based sense of self that gets annihilated and reinitialized every night. :D
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[ 2.8 ms ] story [ 23.3 ms ] threadIn your example if you think that the robot is conscious wouldn't it still be conscious if you replaced the "real world" with a simulation ?