From: zirdum@ccu.umanitoba.ca (Antun Zirdum)
Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy
Subject: Re: The Challenge
Keywords: Searle, Chinese Room
Date: 11 Apr 92 05:53:34 GMT
Organization: University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada

In article <1992Apr9.200513.15480@psych.toronto.edu> michael@psych.toronto.edu (Michael Gemar) writes:
>In article <1992Apr8.074316.29941@ccu.umanitoba.ca> zirdum@ccu.umanitoba.ca (Antun Zirdum) writes:
>>In article <1992Apr7.222046.16470@psych.toronto.edu> michael@psych.toronto.edu (Michael Gemar) writes:
>>>What *empirical* evidence would count?  Remember that we are arguing over
>>>whether having the appropriate behaviour is sufficient evidence for
>>>having a mind.  I may be wrong, but I see *no* way in which this is
>>>amenable to empirical investigation.  
>>
>>It can be investigated using the same techniques we use
>>to determine whether a newborn infant has a mind, or not.
>
>What we were originally arguing about was the sufficiency of the Turing Test.
>If you wish to merely *assert* that behaviour is all there is to minds, then
>fine, but we can't talk....
>
Lately, I have come across far too much of this "fine,
but we can't talk" routine. I get the distinct impression
that you want something from the computer that you cannot
have from anyone/anything - you want to experience the
subjective experience that the computer is having as it
understands. This is clearly impossible, no matter how
much huffing and heaving we do, just resign yourself
to gaining the knowledge of the computers mind through
the methods that people have always used, one of these
methods is the Turing test (people have always used it,
but it was unnamed until Turing came along!)
	Now this is my argument:
What produces behaviour? (a) cause and effect.
What produces *intelligent* behaviour? (a) minds, 
(b) random chance.
Now, if we can convince ourselves that (b) does not
play a role in our AI's (as it does not in computers)
then what's left is a true mind!
>
>>>brain produces meaning.  We *don't* know that computers do.  Even if we
>
>>Every time someone says something like this it makes me
>>a little queasy. What you want to say in the above is
>>"I KNOW *MY* BRAIN PRODUCES MEANING. Fuck your brain,
>>because I have no evidence that it produces meaning!"
>>Another thing, we cannot rule out angels dancing on
>>pinheads as the cause of minds.
>
>Well, if *you* can't rule out angels, then I don't know why you bother to
>discuss the issue.  *I* can rule them out for any number of reasons (e.g.,
>ontological problems). 
>
>>	You have been accused of Solipsism in the extreme!
>>How do you plead?
>
>One does *not* have to be a solipsist to hold this position.  I am quite happy
>to believe that other entities *really* have minds.  That is why I am concerned
>about how one would determine such a thing.  On the other hand, those who are
>happy merely to *interpret* a thing as acting *as if* it had a mind seem not
>to be all that committed to the reality of minds.  
>
If one holds this position, one IS a solipsist! That is why
you are having such difficulty determining such things!
I am also commited to the reality of minds, however, if you
hold the view that your mind is reality then you are in
big trouble.
>- michael


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*   AZ    -- zirdum@ccu.umanitoba.ca                            *
*     " The first hundred years are the hardest! " - W. Mizner  *
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Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy