From newshub.ccs.yorku.ca!ists!helios.physics.utoronto.ca!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!usc!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!comp.vuw.ac.nz!canterbury.ac.nz!cosc.canterbury.ac.nz!chisnall Fri Jan 31 10:27:37 EST 1992
Article 3326 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy
Subject: Re: Intelligence Testing
Message-ID: <1992Feb1.011414.3680@csc.canterbury.ac.nz>
>From: chisnall@cosc.canterbury.ac.nz (The Technicolour Throw-up)
Date: 1 Feb 92 01:14:12 +1300
Reply-To: chisnall@cosc.canterbury.ac.nz
References: <12099@optima.cs.arizona.edu>
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>From article <12099@optima.cs.arizona.edu>, by gudeman@cs.arizona.edu (David Gudeman):
> In article  <386@tdatirv.UUCP> Stanley Friesen writes:
> ]In article <11920@optima.cs.arizona.edu> gudeman@cs.arizona.edu (David Gudeman) writes:
> 
> ]You certainly *seemed* to be implying that comprehension of mechanisms
> ]removes the hypothesis of understanding.
> 
> No, all I said is that once you know the behavior can be explained
> entirely in terms of programming, you no longer have any motivation
> for assuming that the behavior is caused by consciousness.

Complete and utter balderdash.  Once we know how human behaviour can be
explained in terms of neurochemicals, phonons, quantum effects etc will we
cease to view ourselves as conscious?  Its inherent in materialism that
human behaviour is capable of being explained in such terms (even if human
scientists never get to figure out all the details).  Does the existence
of a mechanistic explanation for our behaviour have to cause us to deny
our own perceptions that we are conscious?

> ]As long as there is only one reasonable way of generating a given behavior,
> ]then that behavior is circumstantial evidence for that mechanism.
> ][That is by applying the criterion of 'preponderance of the evidence'].
> 
> AAAAAAAGH!  For the 192nd time: THE VERY HYPOTHESIS OF THE TURING TEST
> IS THAT THE BEHAVIOR CAN BE GENERATED BY PURELY MECHANICAL MEANS.

Relax David and re-read what he said a bit more carefully.  If there is
only one way of generating a certain behaviour then that behaviour is
evidence that that particular process is occurring.  The whole problem
with the validity of the turing test is that we don't yet know whether
there is essentially only one way of achieving consciousness.

> That IS another "reasonable" way of generating the behavior.  If you

I'm intrigued by your use of the word "another" here.  Have you somehow
established, without telling the world at large, that if machines are
capable of achieving consciousness that they must do so by mechanisms
quite distinct in kind from those that humans use?  I thought this was
still an open question.

> want to claim that the Turing test is evidence of consciousness it is
> up to YOU to show that there is some relationship between this
> mechanical behavior and consciousness.  YOU CAN'T JUST KEEP SAYING
> THAT CONSCIOUSNESS IS THE ONLY KNOWN WAY OF GENERATING INTELLIGENT
> BEHAVIOR AFTER YOU HAVE ASSUMED THAT INTELLIGENT BEHAVIOR CAN BE
> GENERATED MECHANICALLY.

Come on David admit it - you're a dualist aren't you?  The only
interpretation I can put on your COMMENT is that you have already
determined that no mechanistic process is capable of generating
consciousness.  Your COMMENT seems to suggest that you've already made up
your mind that consciousness is inherently non-mechanistic.

> ]Actually, in practice, I would like to know enough about the mechanism
> ]to be sure the system is not giving 'canned' answers.  But beyond that I
> ]am not sure I care what the mechanism is.
> 
> That is the whole point.  Computers can't possibly be programmed to do
> anything but give "canned" answers.  That's how computers work. 

I take it therefore that you think that 'cc' or 'tr' or 'sed' give canned
answers?

> The belief that the Turing test shows consciousness amounts to the belief
> that computers are conscious _in spite of the fact that they are giving
> "canned" answers_.

So what you're saying is that computers can never achieve consciousness
because they don't have Free Will (and that consciousness is absolutely
incompatible with determinism)?
--
Just my two rubber ningis worth.
Name: Michael Chisnall          email: chisnall@cosc.canterbury.ac.nz


