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From: pnettlet@gara.une.oz.au (Philip Nettleton)
Newsgroups: comp.ai
Subject: Re: Value of turing test?
Summary: Did I miss something, or didn't we already cover this?
Message-ID: <3241@gara.une.oz.au>
Date: 18 Aug 90 07:37:28 GMT
References: <2860@bruce.cs.monash.OZ.AU> <3156@gara.une.oz.au> <3231@psueea.UUCP> <2356@eisvxe.moundst.mn.org>
Distribution: comp
Organization: University of New England, Armidale, Australia
Lines: 56

In article <2356@eisvxe.moundst.mn.org>, cr_kempke@eisvxe.moundst.mn.org (Travelling SMU GURU) writes:
> 
> 	Actually, I have an even larger problem with the Turing Test:  I don't
> believe most PEOPLE could pass it.   When most of us converse (verbally), we
> stutter, make mistakes, lie, misunderstand, fail to communicate, etc. etc.
> More importantly, not all of US are equally skilled in every domain.  For
> example, if you asked me about sports figures or basic Newtonian physics, I
> might not be able to answer even "simple" domain-specific questions. ...

A computer, imitating a human, would also need to be able to imitate human
limitations. It would require a persona, it would need to make the occasional
mistake and it would know only domain-specific information for that persona
(or at least give the impression that that was the case). If this was not so,
it would be EASY to pick the computer, it would be too clever to be believed.

The interrogator would be an EXTREMELY skilled person and would have to allow
for human error, otherwise, as you say, no human could pass the Turing Test.
As such the computer would need to imitate human error to throw the interrogator
off completely.

The Turing Test, when applied correctly, should act much like the jury system.
It is better to let ten guilty people go free than to convict an innocent
person wrongly. That is, if your human, you should pass the Turing Test.
Therefore, if you can't pass the Turing Test, your almost certainly not human.

> ... If you were talking across a teletype to me, and were fairly convinced
> that I was a computer, I could do little to convince you otherwise, despite
> the fact that I am ALLEGEDLY intelligent.

I'm sure your a computer - prove me wrong :-).

> 	The Turing test fails because of the fundamental problem that there's 
> no good definition of intelligence, but it's a fair estimate.  We just have
> to make sure that we're not requiring the computer to solve a harder task
> than we ourselves do.  We have a habit of defining intelligence as "Anything
> we can do that a mere computer can't", which will get us nowhere in the end.

"Fails" is far to strong a word to use here. The Turing Test does not attempt to
say what intelligence IS, it just compares one (known) type of intelligent
behaviour with another. If the computer's behaviour cannot be distinguished
from a human's behaviour then we have no cause for not attributing the computer
with the same intelligence as observed in humans, even it is IS only an act.

Remember the computer's REAL intelligence may be very alien to the biological
style of intelligence we all know and love. But as long as it can act the part
of a human, probably requiring a superior intelligence under the circumstances,
this ability itself demonstrates its intelligence, even if it is a totally alien
(non-biological) variety.

						Philip Nettleton,
						Tutor in Computer Science,
						University of New England,
						Armidale,
						New South Wales,
						2351,
						AUSTRALIA.