To everyone that posted to this thread, thanks. I've found it terribly interesting, and now I've got some more reading to do.
Re:Chinese Rooms and Software Guys
on
Arguing A.I.
·
· Score: 1
You and Searle are profoundly underestimating the complexity and sophistication of such a translating book. You are building your scenario on a very naive and uninformed view of language -- a view where some sort of a simple "lookup table" would suffice.
This is a given. Of course this is impossible. But you would say that having a look-up table that encapsulates all possible sentence-level inputs and outputs in Chinese is the same as knowing Chinese? That's a hard statement to defend.
As such, Searle's view is necessarily metaphysical, as he is essentially assuming a "soul" where comprehension occurs.
I don't see that. The basis of this all is that humans have consciousness, and that comprehension takes place - Searle never claims a soul exists or any such thing. What he does claim is that this mind thing is the product of a brain (and most likely it doesn't have to be human-like or meat-based, but that's all we've seen so far). And our only eample (humans) most certainly operate with meaning, and not just semantics.
Even if Searle's argument is worthless, I still don't see how symbol manipulation becomes constiuitive of semantics. This doesn't deny many forms of AI, of course, just strong AI.
But, anyway, my favorite discussion of this is "Backtracking: the Chinese food problem," Lou Hoebel, Chris Welty, intelligence March 1999, 10:1.
I just read the article (thanks, ACM) - it's pretty funny. Thanks for the citation.
Re:Chinese Rooms and Software Guys
on
Arguing A.I.
·
· Score: 1
Re dualism - why must philosophers take the logical extremes of every argument? the "mind" is a concept invented by humans to make themselves feel special. We have no proof that other animals aren't thinking in the abstract and just haven't figured out how to express it yet.
If you must insist that the concept of the mind refers to a real thing, then why is it something that has to be a presence? can it not be the sum of a brain working in concert with sensory organs to produce a set of electrical impulses? Why does it have to be this great concept of consciousness?
The mind is a real thing, even if we have trouble defining it. But you have an "inner monologue," to use a rather hokey term. If you ignore this, you're evading the question. It can (and is, to all but religionists) just the sum of the brain working in concert with sensory organs. The point of original (strong) AI is to make a program have a mind, and while we only have one full example, we do acknowledge that inner monologue to be a part of intelligence.
As for the sense of "I" being prgrammed by society, I respectfully disagree. But, since we've only got a sample set of one species so far, it's hard to say.
Re:Chinese Rooms and Software Guys
on
Arguing A.I.
·
· Score: 2, Informative
Not exactly.
The specific point Searle is making is based on a presumption that abstract symbol manipulation (the kind that computers perform) is "neither constituitive of nor sufficient for semantics." This is where most of the attacks have gone after, but to my knowledge unsuccesfully.
You are correct in saying the man is not required to know Chinese any more than the processor knows LISP. But do you say the system - the processor and software code - "understands" LISP? Of course not - it can process it, yes (manipulate the symbols). Does it "understand" in our traditional use of that word? No. Then comes the analogy to the sytem of the man in the room and the rules themselves. Somehow this "system" understands Chinese? Not in the least - it is merely able to manipulate symbols in a manner that satisfies an external observer.
To say that consciousness can be created simply by instantiating a program is (according to Searle) a flawed proposition. He never said that machine consciousness is impossible as a whole, and he never said that human meat-machines are the only possible consciousness; he merely said that a program cannot be.
BTW, the quote is from "Is the Brain's Mind a Computer Program?" by Searle, in Scientific American, January 1990. It went a long with a attempted refutation by the Churchlands, and it's a more clear illustration of the principal than Searle's original paper.
Re:Chinese Rooms and Software Guys
on
Arguing A.I.
·
· Score: 1
A dishonest argument? I don't see it. "The Translating book knows Chinese and English." This is the argument that the whole system knows Chinese, correct? That's easily refutable, and Searle has done so. Say the person internalizes the translating book - that way there is no external instructions on how to translate the characters. At this point, the symbolic manipulations still do not result in a real understanding of Chinese. Trivial? Maybe I'm dumb (it's happened before), but I don't see it. Do you have a more thorough refutation?
Chinese Rooms and Software Guys
on
Arguing A.I.
·
· Score: 3, Insightful
It's always seemed funny to me how the technologists take this field, which is tied irrevocably to philosophy, and ignore everything the philosophers say about it. For example, has there ever been a good refutation of Searle's Chinese Room argument?
Another of Searle's arguments is pretty damning as well; those that pursue strong AI are, in fact, favoring a form of dualism. For them the mind is completely separate from the brain, an idea that has been pretty much discarded by the thinking public. Why is it, when computers are concerned, that the mind is no longer a product of a brain?
Slashdot Mirror
To everyone that posted to this thread, thanks. I've found it terribly interesting, and now I've got some more reading to do.
This is a given. Of course this is impossible. But you would say that having a look-up table that encapsulates all possible sentence-level inputs and outputs in Chinese is the same as knowing Chinese? That's a hard statement to defend.
I don't see that. The basis of this all is that humans have consciousness, and that comprehension takes place - Searle never claims a soul exists or any such thing. What he does claim is that this mind thing is the product of a brain (and most likely it doesn't have to be human-like or meat-based, but that's all we've seen so far). And our only eample (humans) most certainly operate with meaning, and not just semantics.
Even if Searle's argument is worthless, I still don't see how symbol manipulation becomes constiuitive of semantics. This doesn't deny many forms of AI, of course, just strong AI.
I just read the article (thanks, ACM) - it's pretty funny. Thanks for the citation.
The mind is a real thing, even if we have trouble defining it. But you have an "inner monologue," to use a rather hokey term. If you ignore this, you're evading the question. It can (and is, to all but religionists) just the sum of the brain working in concert with sensory organs. The point of original (strong) AI is to make a program have a mind, and while we only have one full example, we do acknowledge that inner monologue to be a part of intelligence.
As for the sense of "I" being prgrammed by society, I respectfully disagree. But, since we've only got a sample set of one species so far, it's hard to say.
Not exactly.
The specific point Searle is making is based on a presumption that abstract symbol manipulation (the kind that computers perform) is "neither constituitive of nor sufficient for semantics." This is where most of the attacks have gone after, but to my knowledge unsuccesfully.
You are correct in saying the man is not required to know Chinese any more than the processor knows LISP. But do you say the system - the processor and software code - "understands" LISP? Of course not - it can process it, yes (manipulate the symbols). Does it "understand" in our traditional use of that word? No. Then comes the analogy to the sytem of the man in the room and the rules themselves. Somehow this "system" understands Chinese? Not in the least - it is merely able to manipulate symbols in a manner that satisfies an external observer.
To say that consciousness can be created simply by instantiating a program is (according to Searle) a flawed proposition. He never said that machine consciousness is impossible as a whole, and he never said that human meat-machines are the only possible consciousness; he merely said that a program cannot be.
BTW, the quote is from "Is the Brain's Mind a Computer Program?" by Searle, in Scientific American, January 1990. It went a long with a attempted refutation by the Churchlands, and it's a more clear illustration of the principal than Searle's original paper.
A dishonest argument? I don't see it. "The Translating book knows Chinese and English." This is the argument that the whole system knows Chinese, correct? That's easily refutable, and Searle has done so. Say the person internalizes the translating book - that way there is no external instructions on how to translate the characters. At this point, the symbolic manipulations still do not result in a real understanding of Chinese. Trivial? Maybe I'm dumb (it's happened before), but I don't see it. Do you have a more thorough refutation?
It's always seemed funny to me how the technologists take this field, which is tied irrevocably to philosophy, and ignore everything the philosophers say about it. For example, has there ever been a good refutation of Searle's Chinese Room argument?
Another of Searle's arguments is pretty damning as well; those that pursue strong AI are, in fact, favoring a form of dualism. For them the mind is completely separate from the brain, an idea that has been pretty much discarded by the thinking public. Why is it, when computers are concerned, that the mind is no longer a product of a brain?
Hate to tell you this, kid, but Quake 3 isn't open source. Not in the least.
Maybe they're using a proxy bot, or something like that? That's what it sounds like to me.
Regardless, this has nothing to do with open source.
Actually, usps priority takes 2-3 days, usually.