Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!usc!ucsd!ogicse!milton!forbis
From: forbis@milton.u.washington.edu (Gary Forbis)
Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy
Subject: Symbol Manipulation? (was: IF IT DOES NOT PASS TT ...)
Message-ID: <1991Jun22.214056.15410@milton.u.washington.edu>
Date: 22 Jun 91 21:40:56 GMT
References: <9106200231.AA06339@lilac.berkeley.edu> <608@ckgp.UUCP>
Organization: University of Washington, Seattle
Lines: 35

In article <608@ckgp.UUCP> thomas@ckgp.UUCP (Michael Thomas) writes:
>  |o| - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -|o|
>  |o| So if the goal is to pass the test, win the game and that  |o|
>  |o| application is imitation of a person, and the knowledge is |o|
>  |o| the knowledge of the world and people, then a computer     |o|
>  |o| will never be intelligent because it atleast at this point |o|
>  |o| can not experience the world... so then only an android    |o|
>  |o| or robot, with a sensory system could pass the TT.         |o|
>  |o| I personally don't feel that this is true...               |o|
>  |o| - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -|o|

I want to focus on a single issue because I fail to see the point
yet it is used by many to say something about computers.

I have heard the problem stated: "Computers are just symbol manipulators."
In the above it goes "...at this point can not experience the world...".

I have tried to decide what I was.  I don't experience the world but merely
recieve signals I believe to be from that world and produce some signals
I believe have an effect in the world.  I don't consider myself only a
symbol manipulator yet I fail to see the real world except though the
signals I recieve and interpret as representational of the world.  These
signals represent my experiences.

Do computers manipulate symbols?  It seems to me that we may interpret what
computers do as manipulating symbols but the computers are just doing what
computers do with those signals they recieve.  Can I call this other than
experiencing the world?  

Maybe computers' sensory apparatus and effectors are limited but is this 
sufficient to say they do not exist?  If computers are not active agents in
the world then why do humans refuse to let me buy things with my pieces of
plastic sometime while gladly accepting them in payment at other times?

--gary forbis@u.washington.edu