I suppose you could argue that none of those had the actual engineers behind them attempting to replicate "intelligence" though. Just because random people made metaphors doesn't mean the engineers designing them had any illusion that it was nothing like the brain.
My personal opinion is that eventually we may just get advanced enough genetic engineering combined with brain / computer networks that the real A.I. will just be a brain like thing grown in a lab but more specialised. Or who knows - our own brains might have some quantum inner workings as well we are unaware of !
Counterpoint: Our engineers are currently trying to replicate "intelligence" and we think it's like the brain because today we think the brain is where "intelligence" reside, and today we strongly believe that "we" are our brains.
I would argue that the inventors of those past technologies were trying to replicate other things (movement, energy, pressure, pneuma, psyche, physis, whatever) that felt deeply human to them, and that in the zeitgeist of his time, Hero of Alexandria (1 BC) could also have said:
> I suppose you could argue that none of the stories of the past had the actual philosophers behind them attempting to replicate "pneuma" though.
Paracelse was trying to create a homonculus by using semen, manure, and blood in the 16th century or so.
A few decades or centuries from now, maybe engineers will try to replicate "consciousness" (though it's pretty clear that Anthropic is already trying) when it has become clear to 22nd century people that giving an object "intelligence" gets you no closer to recreating humanity than "movement through pneumatics" does.
My personal opinion is that eventually we may just get advanced enough genetic engineering combined with brain / computer networks that the real A.I. will just be a brain like thing grown in a lab but more specialised. Or who knows - our own brains might have some quantum inner workings as well we are unaware of !