Slashdot Mirror

I'm wondering if anyone has attempted to link the knowledge stores of an AI chatbot like Alicebot.

I enjoy the fact that she can learn, but it seems she would learn at a much faster pace if she could link with other Alicebots via Jabber to syncronize her data stores.

i don't that would work, due to the sheer number of advances in technology that could easily be catagorized into "AI".

would GTA3 be in the same catagory as alicebot? you could catagorize both of those under "AI", however, i would think gta3 more appropriately belongs in games and alicebot in the CS section.

"AI" is just too loose of a term to make a category out of; why not just make a category called "Computer Technology" and bundle all the articles under that banner?

Look at a few of the bots out there. Alicebot for example. You get this bot talking to someone over ICQ for a little bit and they will not know the difference. The machine wouldn't be able to beat an AI researcher who knows how to ask it the correct questions to reveal that it's a machine, but to a regular human they could have a long conversation and the human would never know.

Crazier than a shithouse rat, that Wallace is.

it was curious that i found the inclusion of the Turing Test on your web-site, but i found no corresponding counter-balancing link to Searle's Chineese Room (Minds Brains and Programs).

however:

The Turing test enshrines the temptation to think that if something
behaves as if it had certain mental processes, then it must actually
have those mental processes. And this is part of the behaviourist's
mistaken assumption that in order to be scientific, psychology must
confine its study to externally observable behaviour. Paradoxically,
this residual behaviourism is tied to a residual dualism. .... The
mind, they suppose, is something formal and abstract, not a part of
the wet slimy stuff in our heads. ...unless one accepts the idea that
the mind is completely independent of the brain or of any other
physically specific system, one could not possibly hope to create
minds just by designing programs. (Searle 1990a, p. 31)

the point of searle's chinese room is to see if 'understanding'
is involved in the process of computation. if you can 'process'
the symbols of the cards without understanding them (since you're
using a wordbook and a programme to do it) - by putting yourself
in the place of the computer, you yourself can ask yourself if
you required understanding to do it.

since Searle has generally debunked the Turing Test with the
Chineese Room -- and you post only the
Turing Test -- i'd like to ask you personally:

What is your own response to the Chineese
Room argument (or do you just ignore it)?

best regards,
john penner