From newshub.ccs.yorku.ca!ists!helios.physics.utoronto.ca!news-server.ecf!utgpu!cs.utexas.edu!sun-barr!ames!agate!spool.mu.edu!uunet!tdatirv!sarima Wed Feb 26 12:54:22 EST 1992
Article 3997 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: sarima@tdatirv.UUCP (Stanley Friesen)
Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy,sci.philosophy.tech
Subject: Re: Definition of understanding
Message-ID: <447@tdatirv.UUCP>
Date: 24 Feb 92 23:08:43 GMT
References: <43686@dime.cs.umass.edu> <1992Feb22.234252.17095@psych.toronto.edu> <1992Feb23.044200.29383@mp.cs.niu.edu> <1992Feb23.015634.9079@husc3.harvard.edu>
Reply-To: sarima@tdatirv.UUCP (Stanley Friesen)
Followup-To: comp.ai.philosophy
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In article <1992Feb23.015634.9079@husc3.harvard.edu> zeleny@zariski.harvard.edu (Mikhail Zeleny) writes:
|The fact that, in spite of having conducted interminable discussions on
|this subject, you've yet to come up with a conclusive and persuasive
|refutation of Searle's argument leaves me on the horns of a dilemma:
|
|(i) Either you and your coreligionists lack the requisite eristic
|*cleverness* needed in order to make a suitable impression on Searle's
|public; 
|
|or
|
|(ii) The lack is in your abject failure to *understand* the argument.

or iii) we prefer to leave the question open until actual verifiable evidence
is available as to what is true, leaving vacuous logical argumentation to
philosophers and reactionaries.


I do *not* claim to have any final answer, I just find that Searle's
arguments rely too much on unverified, and currently unverifiable,
opinions about what constitutes 'understanding'.


Thus, nothing proven, I keep an open mind.
-- 
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uunet!tdatirv!sarima				(Stanley Friesen)


