Analysis Of The Book ' Searle 's Chinese Room '

The essay “Watson Doesn’t Know It Won on Jeopardy!” is a paper written by John Searle on February 23, 2011 that probes at how IBM’s computer Watson has no human understanding whatsoever. Searle begins by clearing up the common misconceptions about what a computer actually is. Searle explains that a computer is simply a machine that manipulates symbols based on a programs needs and wants, and that the computational power of a computer is not human understanding; it is in fact a measure of how fast a computer can manipulate symbols. Searle then proceeds to explain the process of how a computer works in terms of a human. He explains that a computer does not understand human language at all. A computer just has a program (in binary) that tells

Throughout the readings about Searle and the Chinese Room, the peer commentaries responding to Searle's argument regarding the Chinese Room each point out different faults in Searle's argument. Some of the primarily interesting responses came from Abelson, Fodor, and Libet where they argued that Searle may be demanding too much, not giving enough perspective, and/or that the make-up of the system is not what necessarily gives understanding. Abelson's biggest argument throughout his commentary is that there is not a clear definition to what "intentionality" is. Searle wants the AI to be intentional with its thinking and actions. Abelson says that writing rules to translate symbols is much more complicated than Searle argues.

The purpose of this paper is to present John Searle’s Chinese room argument in which it challenges the notions of the computational paradigm, specifically the ability of intentionality. Then I will outline two of the commentaries following, the first by Bruce Bridgeman, which is in opposition to Searle and uses the super robot to exemplify his point. Then I will discuss John Eccles’ response, which entails a general agreement with Searle with a few objections to definitions and comparisons. My own argument will take a minimalist computational approach delineating understanding and its importance to the concepts of the computational paradigm.

Even with the correct programming a computer cannot freely think for itself, with its own conscious thought. John Searle is a philosopher of mind and language at UC Berkeley. Searle’s Chinese Room Argument is against the premise of Strong AI. He argues that even though a computer may have the ability to compute the use of syntax (Weak AI), a computer could not be able to understand the meaning behind the words it is communicating. Semantics convey both intentional and un-intentional content in communication. Though a computer could be programmed to recognize which words would convey the correct meaning of a symbol. This,

Through the use of his famous Chinese room scenario, John R. Searle tries to prove there is no way artificial intelligence can exist. This means that machines do not posses minds.

The reply states a computer can only derive the semantics from syntax if given enough connections to assist with the derivation from syntax to semantics. However; since the reply is essentially an incomplete argument against Searle’s argument, it is not a very devastating criticism. If the Chinese Room was put into the robot, and I was given all of this syntactical information about the world, I still would not know what the symbols would mean despite what the robot is actually doing because I am only shuffling symbols. I am unable to gain any meaning from them. (Cole, 4.2) The actions of the robot do not prove that the computer operating it is thinking, it only means that it is still able to run through its own

John Searle 1980(in Cooney, 2000), provides a thought experiment, commonly referred to as the Chinese room argument (CRA), to show that computers, programmed to simulate human cognition, are incapable of understanding language. The CRA requires us to consider a scenario where Searle, who is illiterate in Chinese, finds himself locked in a room with a book containing Chinese characters. Additionally, he has another book which has a set of instructions written in English (which he understands), that allows him to match and manipulate the Chinese characters so that he can provide appropriate written responses (in Chinese) to incoming questions, which are also written in Chinese. Moreover, Searle has a pile of blank paper with which he uses to jot down his answers. Subsequently, Searle becomes so proficient in providing responses that the quality of his answers matches that of a native Chinese speaker. Thus, Searle in the CR functions as a computer would, where he is the system while the books are the program and the blank paper acts as storage.

The assumption is that the person is capable of understanding Chinese, simply because he can manage to assemble a set of answers to questions that would be indistiquishable from a person who speaks Chinese. The problem is that the person in the room does not understand any of the answers, but is simply following instructions. Searle utilizes a system’s ability to pass the Turing test as a parameter in the study, though the person would still indeed not understand Chinese. Searle proceeds to refute the claims of strong AI one at a time, by positioning himself as the one who manipulates the Chinese symbols. The first claim is that a system, which can pass the Turing test, understands the input and output. Searle replies that as the "computer" in the Chinese room, he gains no understanding of Chinese by simply manipulating the symbols according to the formal program, in this case being the complex rules. (Searle, 1980) It was not necessary for the operator to have any understanding of what the interviewer is asking, or the replies that produced. He may not even know that there is a question and answer session going on outside the room.

Premise 1 states that programs are syntactical processes. Premise 2 states that minds have mental/semantic contents.

Searle believed that materialism and functionalism did not give a full explanation to the human mind, that there was much more to the human mind then electrochemical activity. He believed that we could teach machines syntax (sentence order) but not semantics (understanding of theme). Therefore computers would not know what they were doing but basically just replying to specific stimuli.

John Searle starts with two claims of programmed computers being able to have a process where they would understand knowledge and the claim of computers understanding how the human mind works. Searle then states that these claims are rather untrue or without reason.

One of the hottest topics that modern science has been focusing on for a long time is the field of artificial intelligence, the study of intelligence in machines or, according to Minsky, “the science of making machines do things that would require intelligence if done by men”.(qtd in Copeland 1). Artificial Intelligence has a lot of applications and is used in many areas. “We often don’t notice it but AI is all around us. It is present in computer games, in the cruise control in our cars and the servers that route our email.” (BBC 1). Different goals have been set for the science of Artificial Intelligence, but according to Whitby the most mentioned idea about the goal of AI is provided by the Turing Test. This test is also called the

Through this, Searle argues that if a human and machine receive the same input and then respond by the same output, how are they any different from one another? When given the same purpose, humans and machines have the same response, therefore machines may have a mind. Gilbert Ryle created The computational theory of mind that claims “Computers behave in seemingly rational ways; their inner program causes them to behave in this way and therefore mental states are just like computational states”. He continues on by saying that “If logic can be used to command, and these commands can be coded into logic, then these commands can be coded in terms of 1s and 0s, therefore giving modern computers logic. Through this, how is one to tell if robots don’t have minds if they use logic just like humans do. When the purpose of humans and machines are the same, they may process differently in order to complete that purpose, although they may have the same output. Because humans and machines receive the same input and return the same output, they both have minds in addition to functions and processes in order to do that.

Roaring Dragon Hotel is a hospitality establishment that is owned by the state (Granger, 2008). The hotel was fairly successful in the planned economy era. However, the hotel

To gain insight on how the mind and brain work the inscription of this proposition will challenge John R. Searle theory on the mind-brain problem, by exploring the works of three theories of philosophy. Materialism who