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Article 5231 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: clarke@next1.acme.ucf.edu (Thomas Clarke)
Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy
Subject: Re: SHRDLU's mind
Message-ID: <1992Apr22.152245.6091@cs.ucf.edu>
Date: 22 Apr 92 15:22:45 GMT
References: <1992Apr17.013517.15215@psych.toronto.edu>
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In article <1992Apr17.013517.15215@psych.toronto.edu> christo@psych.toronto.edu  
(Christopher Green) writes:
> In article <1992Apr13.151731.22702@oracorp.com> daryl@oracorp.com (Daryl  
McCullough) writes:
> >christo@psych.toronto.edu (Christopher D. Green) writes:
> >
> >> Surely whether SHRDLU, thermostats, and rocks have minds is an
> >> empirical question.
> >
> >Surely not. It is a philosophical question, which is the reason that
> >we have this newsgroup. It isn't an empirical question because it
> >doesn't have any observable consequences.
> >
> Surely so. To be empirical, a question must be a matter of fact, not just
> of definition. ----
This is wonderful.  The essence of the argument in plain English.

Might I suggest that the only widely accepted resolution of this problem is the  
Turing test.  That is to have a mind is to be able to pass a Turing test.   
Passing the test is an observable matter of fact and hence is empirical.  

There are difficulties at the margin, of course.  Helen Keller surely has a  
mind, but communication requires some effort on the part of the tester.

The rock and the thermostat fail unless you utilize a Putnumian state  
transformer.  But this is cheating since the bulk of the complexity and hence  
the intelligence resides in the Putnumian transformer, not the thermostat or  
the rock.  (Why does Putnumiam and not Putnamian sound right?  Latin grammar?)

SHRDLU is somewhere in the middle.  It is conceivable that there exists a  
fairly straightforward way to map Turing test questions into block  
configurations and questions, and back again so that SHRDLU passes the Turing  
test.  Provided these mappings are not such blatant cheats as the mappings  
needed for Putnam's rocks, then it would seem inescapable that SHRDLU has a  
mind.

Providing a precise definition of what it means to cheat at a Turing test is  
another story, and is probably the original problem rephrased in another  
context.


