Laws@SRI-STRIPE.ARPA.UUCP (07/14/86)
There is a lengthy rebuttal to Searle's Chinese Room argument as the cover story in the latest Abacus. Dr. Rappaport claims that human understanding (of Chinese or anything else) is different from machine understanding but that both are implementations of an abstract concept, "Understanding". I find this weak on three counts: 1) Any two related concepts share a central core; defining this as the abstract concept of which each is an implementation is suspect. Try to define "chair" or "game" by intersecting the definitions of class members and you will end up with inconsistent or empty abstractions. 2) Saying that machines are capable of "machine understanding", and hence of "Understanding", takes the heart out of the argument. Anyone would agree that a computer can "understand" Chinese (or arithmetic) in a mechanical sense, but that does not advance us toward agreement on whether computers can be intelligent. The issue now becomes "Can machines be given "human" understanding.?" The question is difficult even to state in this framework. 3) Searle's challege needn't have been ducked in this manner. I believe the resolution of the Chinese Room paradox is that, although Searle does not understand Chinese, Searle plus his hypothetical algorithm for answering Chinese queries would constitute a >>system<< that does understand Chinese. The Room understands, even though neither Searle nor his written instruction set understands. By analogy, I would say that Searle understands English even though his brain circuitry (or homunculus or other wetware) does not. I have not read the literature surrounding Searle's argument, but I do not believe this Abacus article has the final word. -- Ken Laws