From newshub.ccs.yorku.ca!ists!helios.physics.utoronto.ca!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!utgpu!pindor Mon Mar  9 18:35:00 EST 1992
Article 4242 of comp.ai.philosophy:
Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy
Path: newshub.ccs.yorku.ca!ists!helios.physics.utoronto.ca!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!utgpu!pindor
>From: pindor@gpu.utcs.utoronto.ca (Andrzej Pindor)
Subject: Re: Definition of understanding
Message-ID: <1992Mar4.145443.13959@gpu.utcs.utoronto.ca>
Keywords: Digital Iconoclasm
Organization: UTCS Public Access
References: <1992Feb28.211025.26278@oracorp.com> <1992Feb29.162020.9271@psych.toronto.edu> <1992Mar3.025214.26880@smsc.sony.com> <1992Mar3.095145.18304@leland.Stanford.EDU>
Date: Wed, 4 Mar 1992 14:54:43 GMT

In article <1992Mar3.095145.18304@leland.Stanford.EDU> shibe@leland.Stanford.EDU (Eric Schaible) writes:
>A further argument along these lines, a twist on one of Searle's:
>the rules of the Chinese Room constitute a program.  One of the hallmarks of
>a program is that it can be implemented on any appropriate sort of 
>computational hardware.  As it happens, one can build a computer by wiring
>together all of the mailboxes in Dubuque (flag up=1, down=0), and one could
>attach an output device which gives out Chinese characters.  Now, if we
>implement the Chinese Room program in the Dubuque computer, we must conclude
>the following:
>
>The mailboxes in Dubuque are having a collective experience of understanding
>Chinese.
>
>
>Do you agree?
>
My question is: How do you know what experiences would a such wired-up 
collection of mailboxes have? Before you say with contempt : 'That's  
ridiculous', consider the following:
Experience of understanding is a _subjective_ phenomenon - strictly speaking
we only know that WE have it. We extrapolate to other people judging from
their behaviour and the fact that 'they are like us'. In case of a different
system (like a wired-up system of mailboxes) we have only the behaviour
to go on. 
I think you let yourself to be prejudiced by the word 'mailbox' - how could 
a mailbox have any experience? How could anyone sane suggest such a thing,
right? But it is not matter of experiences of a single mailbox any more than
a matter of experiences of a single neuron in your case! What collective
properties would such a system of billions of interconnected (0,1) units
(mailboxes or not) have, we have no idea and even less if any of these
properties would resemble `experience of understanding', because we have no
idea how we would recognize 'experience of understanding' inside human brain.

>Eric Schaible
>
>
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-- 
Andrzej Pindor
University of Toronto
Computing Services
pindor@gpu.utcs.utoronto.ca


