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From: bruck@actcom.co.il (Uri Bruck)
Subject: Re: Chomsky on Consciousness and Dennett (performance barriers)
Organization: ACTCOM - Internet Services in Israel
Date: Wed, 14 Jun 1995 21:59:42 GMT
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On Wed, 14 Jun 1995, james peterson wrote:

> >of more than a simple phrase is viable, therefore  I woul;d like to challenge
> >the validity of the Chinese Room analogy as an analogy of a mechanical
> >process.
> >Uri Bruck
> >bruck@actcom.co.il
> >
> 
> I think this is a red herring as far a Searle is concerned.  Since he
> wants to show that passing a Turing Test is a necessary but
> insufficient test of intelligence, he stipulates that the Chinese
> Room passes the test.  He is fairly careful not to make
> any claims about the feasibility of machine translation.  If you

Perhaps a pink herring.
Searle does make a far fetched assumption that understanding is not 
necessary for translation and then presents it as a conclusion.

The whole idea behind the Chinese Room is that translation can be 
performed by an algorithm. If Searle had chosen a less fancy task, then 
the analogy might have carried itself better.
Uri Bruck
bruck@actcom.co.il

