Why Minds Are Not Like Computers.

October 18, 2009 12:59 PM

Why Minds Are Not Like Computers -- examining the failure of "the AI project".
posted by empath (5 comments total)

double
posted by HP LaserJet P10006 at 1:07 PM on October 18, 2009

Ugh. The question isn't whether or not minds are "like" computers but rather whether or not they are isomorphic.

Excluding the amount of RAM, all Turing-complete computers that has ever been built are isomorphic. Given enough time, they can all do the same things (just at different speeds)

Thus Turing said that a computer that passes the test would be regarded as thinking, not that it actually is thinking, or that passing the test constitutes thinking. In fact, Turing specified at the outset that he devised the test because the “question ‛Can machines think?’ I believe to be too meaningless to deserve discussion.” But it is precisely this claim—that passing the Turing Test constitutes thinking—that has become not just a primary standard of success for artificial intelligence research, but a philosophical precept of the project itself.

This precept is based on a crucial misunderstanding of why computers work the way they do.

So, what this guy is saying is that he has a better understanding of "why computers work the way they do" then Alan Turing. Somehow, I think he's gotten that backwards.
posted by delmoi at 1:11 PM on October 18, 2009

Hubert Dreyfus, longtime critic of AI.
posted by Brian B. at 1:11 PM on October 18, 2009

Anyway The Elements of Statistical Learning is available online for free as a PDF. If you want to know what current machine learning is about, that would be a good book to read.
posted by delmoi at 1:14 PM on October 18, 2009

delmoi, you haven't read your own pull-quote carefully enough. In the first paragraph, he makes it clear that Turing did not suffer from his misconception, that he understood very clearly the limited value of the test that has his name. What the para is saying is that despite the fact that Turing himself was under no illusions of its value, it has nevertheless come to be perceived, by others in (presumably in the field) as a valid test of thinking.
posted by George_Spiggott at 1:16 PM on October 18, 2009 [1 favorite]