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Article 3764 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: zeleny@zariski.harvard.edu (Mikhail Zeleny)
Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy
Subject: Re: Humongous table-lookup misapprehensions
Message-ID: <1992Feb15.110632.8836@husc3.harvard.edu>
Date: 15 Feb 92 16:06:30 GMT
References: <1992Feb12.172855.19148@organpipe.uug.arizona.edu> <1992Feb14.015835.22216@ida.liu.se> <1992Feb14.150342.21640@cs.yale.edu>
Organization: Dept. of Math, Harvard Univ.
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In article <1992Feb14.150342.21640@cs.yale.edu> 
mcdermott-drew@CS.YALE.EDU (Drew McDermott) writes:

>In article <1992Feb14.015835.22216@ida.liu.se> 
>c89ponga@odalix.ida.liu.se (Pontus Gagge) writes:

>  >bill@NSMA.AriZonA.EdU (Bill Skaggs) writes:

>  >>In article <1992Feb12.002312.19459@ida.liu.se> 
>  >>c89ponga@odalix.ida.liu.se (Pontus Gagge) writes:

PG:
>  >>>Is everybody happy that a DFA exists which passes a Turing Test, and
>  >>>does so in a completely uninteresting manner? Is the Turing Test still
>  >>>a good criterion for intelligence?

BS:
>  >>  I'm not happy.

DMD:
>I'm not happy either.  In one breath you say a "DFA exists"; in the
>next breath, the story about how it comes to exist makes it obvious
>that it never really could exist:

I wouldn't want to presume being able to speak for Pontus, but since my
name came up in the course of this discussion, I will offer the reasons for
my agreeing with his statement.  Briefly, a DFA is an abstract object,
hence the constraints on its existence are strictly logical; purely
practical considerations won't suffice to prove its non-existence, while a
demonstration of its logical possibility will suffice to prove the contrary.

PG:
>  >An infinitely dedicated creator is given the task to create the table
>  >for all conversations lasting less than a century. In order to avoid
>  >certain practical problems we give her a turbo-charged longevity
>  >drug, and put her in a timewarp, where she can happily hack away for 
>  >the requisite >>10E100 years. In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, :-)
>  >she emerges, hands us the table, which proceeds to pass the Turing Test.

DMD:
>I'm no fan of the Turing Test, but if a machine could pass it, no one
>would for a moment entertain the hypothesis that such a creator had
>actually visited such a timewarp, etc., etc.  So whatever power it had
>as a criterion it still has after hearing this fantasy.

While I am inclined to agree with the above for practical reasons, I feel
that there is some confusion involved in the position of at least one of my
esteemed interlocutors.  In effect, the demonstration of existence of a DFA
offers no guarantee of the (physical, biological, socioeconomic, etc....)
possibility of bringing into existence a concrete material artefact
implementing such a DFA.  In effect, this consideration is similar in
nature to my earlier objection to the possibility of an actual "table
look-up machine", based on the prediction that the pseudo-discourse of 
such a machine would inevitably fail on pragmatic grounds, due to the
conversational ubiquity of essentially indexical terms.

>                                             -- Drew McDermott


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: Mikhail Zeleny                                                     :
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