Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!lll-winken!lll-lcc!mordor!sri-spam!ames!aurora!labrea!agate!ucbvax!MITRE-BEDFORD.ARPA!bwk
From: bwk@MITRE-BEDFORD.ARPA (Barry W. Kort)
Newsgroups: comp.ai.digest
Subject: Re: Self-conscious code and the Chinese room
Message-ID: <8802011859.AA13035@linus.research>
Date: 1 Feb 88 18:59:19 GMT
References: <8802010202.AA16884@sphinx.uchicago.edu>
Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
Reply-To: bwk@mbunix (Barry Kort)
Organization: The MITRE Corporation, Bedford, Mass.
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Keywords: self-modifying code
Approved: ailist@kl.sri.com

Jorn Berger identifies an important characteristic of an intelligent
system:  namely the ability to learn and evolve its intelligence.

In thinking about artificial intelligence, I like to draw a distinction
between a sapient system and a sentient system.  A sapient system reposes
knowledge, but does not evolve.  A sentient system adds to its abilities
as it goes along.  It learns.

If the Chinese Room not only applied the rules for manipulating the
squiggles and squoggles, but also evolved the rules themselves so
as to improve its ability to synopsize a story, then we would be more
sympathetic to the suggestion that the room was intelligent.

Here is where the skeleton key comes in.  In computer programming, there
is no inherent taboo that prevents a program from modifying its own code.
Most programmers religiously avoid such practice, because it usually leads
to suicidal outcomes.  But there are good examples of game-playing
programs that do evolve their heuristic rules based on experience.

Jacob Bronoswki has said that if man is any kind of machine, he is
a learning machine.  I think that Minsky would agree.

Now if we can just work out the algorithms for learning...

--Barry Kort