Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!mailrus!cornell!oravax!daryl
From: daryl@oravax.UUCP (Steven Daryl McCullough)
Newsgroups: comp.ai
Subject: Re: Can Machines Think?
Summary: The issue for strong AI is whether it is possible to have a human-like
	 mind without having a human-like body.
Message-ID: <1336@oravax.UUCP>
Date: 13 Feb 90 14:36:52 GMT
References: <898D02hl87rd01@amdahl.uts.amdahl.com> <6573@uhccux.uhcc.hawaii.edu> <e58H02l087KM01@amdahl.uts.amdahl.com>
Organization: Odyssey Research Associates, Ithaca NY
Lines: 52

In article <e58H02l087KM01@amdahl.uts.amdahl.com>, kp@uts.amdahl.com (Ken
Presting) writes:
> In article <6573@uhccux.uhcc.hawaii.edu> lee@uhccux.uhcc.hawaii.edu (Greg
Lee) writes:
> >From article <898D02hl87rd01@amdahl.uts.amdahl.com>, by kp@uts.amdahl.com
(Ken Presting):
> >> ... But notice that if his questioner should
> >> ask Searle his name, or the time of day, or the color of his tie, he
> >> would *not* be able to answer correctly. ...
> >
> >Yes, he would:
> >
> >	name?: (in Chinese) Hao Wang.
> >	time?: (in Chinese) I'm not wearing my watch.
> >	tie color?: (in Chinese) Green.
> 
> I'm not sure what you have in mind.
> 
> If the answers are false, Chinese interrogators will know Searle is faking.
> Searle may not know the difference between "Hao Wang" and "John Searle"
> (printed in Chinese characters), but the audience would.  When I said
> "answer correctly" I meant "make a statement which is true", not just
> "make a statement that is meaningful Chinese, relevant to the topic of
> the question".

In the original Turing Test, it was required that the interrogator
only be able to question the "contestant" via a teletype system, not
in "person". The reason for this stipulation is that the goal of
artificial intelligence is to reproduce a human mind, *not* a human
body. It isn't fair, then, to look at the contestant and say "Hey, I
can tell you are a computer by your keyboard!" Likewise, I think it is
not fair in the Chinese Room to test the veracity of answers like
"What color tie are you wearing?". If Searle keeps inside the Chinese
Room, then the interrogator wouldn't be able to know that the answer
is false. Answering *correctly* is not required for the Turing Test,
only answering convincingly.

Someone in this newsgroup (I don't remember who) brought up the issue
that if computer program succeeded in passing the Turing Test, it
would have to do so through lying; it would have to claim to be a
human being, to have headaches occasionally, to wear green ties, etc.
I don't think the fact that these claims are false should in any way
be held against the computer program; it could very well have the
*mind* of a human being with stomach aches, etc., and so could be
answering truthfully as far as it knows. A human being can be
similarly mistaken about the state of his or her own body; for
example, the "phantom limb" experience of amputees, or the "phantom
odors" experienced when one's brain is stimulated by an electrode.


Daryl McCullough, Odyssey Research Associates
oravax.uucp!daryl@cu-arpa.cs.cornell.edu