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From: dan-hankins@cup.portal.com (Daniel B Hankins)
Newsgroups: comp.ai
Subject: Question on Chinese Room argument
Message-ID: <15470@cup.portal.com>
Date: 7 Mar 89 00:15:36 GMT
Organization: The Portal System (TM)
Lines: 30


     Here is my understanding of the external view of Searle's Chinese Room
thought experiment:

     There is a room, and there are one or more native speakers of Chinese.
 The native speakers write things in Chinese (questions, comments,
whatever), and pass these pieces of paper into the room.  Out come other
pieces of paper with Chinese symbols on them.

     All the native speakers *claim that there is a native Chinese speaker
in the room*.  And to put Searle's argument to the most stringent test, we
must put no limits on how much conversation the native Chinese speaker
engages in before coming to a decision, nor must there be any limit on what
questions he can ask or conversations he can engage in, nor can there be
any limit on the number of native speakers asked to decide whether the room
contains another Chinese person.

     So the native speakers claim that there is something in the room that
understands Chinese.

     Here is the crucial question:  *Without opening up the room to see
what is inside*, what basis do we have for disbelieving the native speakers?

     The fact of the matter is, *we don't*.  *Something* in there is
understanding Chinese.

     It ain't Searle;  so what is it?


Dan Hankins