From newshub.ccs.yorku.ca!ists!helios.physics.utoronto.ca!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!psych.toronto.edu!michael Wed Feb 26 12:54:18 EST 1992
Article 3990 of comp.ai.philosophy:
Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy
Path: newshub.ccs.yorku.ca!ists!helios.physics.utoronto.ca!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!psych.toronto.edu!michael
>From: michael@psych.toronto.edu (Michael Gemar)
Subject: Re: Definition of understanding
Message-ID: <1992Feb25.013333.25452@psych.toronto.edu>
Organization: Department of Psychology, University of Toronto
References: <1992Feb22.181122.12088@oracorp.com> <6254@skye.ed.ac.uk> <1992Feb24.231735.4404@gpu.utcs.utoronto.ca>
Date: Tue, 25 Feb 1992 01:33:33 GMT

In article <1992Feb24.231735.4404@gpu.utcs.utoronto.ca> pindor@gpu.utcs.utoronto.ca (Andrzej Pindor) writes:

>Although I am not an 'AI type', I find Searle's use of word 'understanding'
>too fuzzy. I have already pointed out in a previous posting that the stories
>presented to CR can be 'understood' at different levels,  and argued that for
>a certain meaning of the stories the precise meaning of the words is irrelevant.
>Hence one can understand certain aspects of the stories without knowing what
>a 'hamburger' or a 'restaurant' is. May be I have not my point clear enough,
>I ll try again.
>

[cute story deleted]

>    In a similiar way, the story which is presented to CR can be considered 
>a puzzle (together with the question) to be solved. Since there are more words
>in the story than in the number example above (only three) and relationships
>between these words are more complicated than the rules of the number system
>above, you need a computer to solve the puzzle, but it can be done without
>knowing precise meaning of the words. To solve arithmetic problems in the 
>example above one did not need to know that pennies were round, made of copper
>and that a pint of milk in those days used to cost a sixpence. And still
>solving the arithmetic problems correctly indicated that one understood the
>problems. Anyone against? Why is then incorrect to say that answering 
>correctly the questions put to CR indicates that it understands a certain
>meaning of the story, even if the person inside does not understand the exact
>meaning of the words? Hanard's trick obscures totally the fact that the story
>can be understood a different levels. A single word 'understand' does not 
>distinguish between these different levels.
>   There is a level at which the story can be understood without understanding
>the words. Is this so difficult to understand (:-))?

Look, gang, this *isn't* hard!  All that is required for the Chinese
Room demonstration to work is that you agree that in that situation
you wouldn't understand Chinese in *exactly* the same way you understand
English, *whatever way that might be*.  The question is not whether
the CR "understands" in some obscure way that we have previously
unidentified - it is instead whether it *understands*, without quotes,
in the good-old-fashioned sense of the word we use when we say, for
example, "I don't understand Hungarian."  This is *all* that is required
for the CR example to work.  We can discuss what the nature of understanding
is, and if it is multifaceted or not, but that does not add *at all* to
the CR debate.  There is no linguistic trick being played here, and
those who suggest otherwise are either confused or being disingenuous.

- michael
 



