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Article 2977 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: orourke@unix1.cs.umass.edu (Joseph O'Rourke)
Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy
Subject: Re: Intelligence Testing
Message-ID: <42064@dime.cs.umass.edu>
Date: 22 Jan 92 01:54:58 GMT
References: <11722@optima.cs.arizona.edu>
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Reply-To: orourke@sophia.smith.edu (Joseph O'Rourke)
Organization: Smith College, Northampton, MA, US
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In article <11722@optima.cs.arizona.edu> gudeman@cs.arizona.edu (David Gudeman) writes:
>It is impossible in principle for one agent to distinguish between
>"knowledge" and "understanding" in another agent, because the
>difference is only sensible to the agent who has (or doesn't have)
>understanding.

It is also impossible in principle to exclude the possibility that
we were all created a minute ago, memories intact, as Russell pointed
out.  I was responding to the question of why conversation could be 
strong empirical evidence for understanding.  If you define understanding 
to require unobservable "internal self-awareness," then of course
it is impossible to establish beyond the shadow of doubt.  But
the common meaning of "understand" is "to grasp the meaning of"
(Webster's 7th, definition 1a).  And I continue to believe that

	][a deep conversation] could
	]constitute as strong an indication of the existence of understanding
	]as is conceivable.


