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Article 4530 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: daryl@oracorp.com (Daryl McCullough)
Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy
Subject: Re: Definition of understanding
Message-ID: <1992Mar17.213546.25838@oracorp.com>
Date: 17 Mar 92 21:35:46 GMT
Article-I.D.: oracorp.1992Mar17.213546.25838
Organization: ORA Corporation
Lines: 34

jeff@aiai.ed.ac.uk (Jeff Dalton) writes:

[About what Strong AI would say about the case of the man in
the Chinese Room memorizing the rules]

> ...we still need something to say which of the following would obtain:
> 
>   1. The person in the Room (not some second person) would
>      understand Chinese.
> 
>   2. A second person would be created and would continue to
>      exist so long as the person in the Room continued to follow
>      the memorized rules.
> 
>   3. A second person would be created and would persist no matter
>      what the original person did (perhaps because memorizing the
>      program set up the right causal structures).
> 
>   and perhaps others

Good to hear from you again, Jeff. I think that of these 3
possibilities, only number 2. can work. As far as number 1, it's
obvious that memorizing the Chinese Room rules would not allow someone
to translate between English and Chinese, which you would expect a
person who understood both English and Chinese to be able to do. As
far as number 3. is concerned, I don't see how memorization sets up
any particular "causal structure" if the rules aren't carried out.  To
me, the only meaning to a program is a specification of a state
machine; if the specification is not met, then you don't have the
state machine any more than buying a blueprint will give you a house.

Daryl McCullough
ORA Corp.
Ithaca, NY


