Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!think.com!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!casbah.acns.nwu.edu!ils.nwu.edu!aristotle.ils.nwu.edu!shafto
From: shafto@aristotle.ils.nwu.edu (Eric Shafto)
Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy
Subject: Re: Turing Test: opinions on an idea
Message-ID: <1777@anaxagoras.ils.nwu.edu>
Date: 19 May 91 18:45:20 GMT
References: <91138.123053DOCTORJ@SLACVM.SLAC.STANFORD.EDU>
Sender: news@ils.nwu.edu
Distribution: usa
Organization: The Institute for the Learning Sciences
Lines: 28

DOCTORJ@SLACVM.SLAC.STANFORD.EDU (Jon J Thaler) writes:
> In article <1744@anaxagoras.ils.nwu.edu>, will@aristotle.ils.nwu.edu (William
> Fitzgerald) says:
 
> >I'm reading a book called _The Vastness of Natural Languages_ by
> >Langendoen and Postal, in which they claim/prove that no
> >natural language is recursively enumerable.  Accepting
> >this as true, this means there is no Turing Machine which can
> >be built to recognize the sentences of a natural language.
 
> It's interesting to turn this around and ask whether human intelligence
> can recognize (all of) the sentences of a natural language.

An even more interesting point arises from your point.  If no human
can recognize all the sentences in a natural language, how are you
defining the language?

If you can't even DEFINE the language, recursive enumerability is
the least of your problems.

Along the same vein, I find most of Searle's arguments have the same
failing:  they prove that no computer could do something that I'm
not sure any human could do.
--
*Eric Shafto             * Sometimes, I think we are alone.  Sometimes I  *
*Institute for the       * think we are not.  In either case, the thought *
*    Learning Sciences   * is quite staggering.                           *
*Northwestern University *     -- R. Buckminster Fuller                   *