[lit-ideas] Re: The Answering Machine

>> A Turing test is based on the idea, you've got this right, that
if you talk with the machine can can't tell the difference between
talking with a machine and talking with a person, you call the
machine intelligent.

There are a number of bot Web sites that allow people to give a bot
a Turing test. (Sounds vaguely smutty.)

Tried a few. It's easy to make them flunk. Play Socrates. Ask them
what meaning is, or ask them to define personal identity. Something
like that. Programmers, being children of their age, design the bot
to make a few coy, relativistic, banal replies, and soon the machine
tries to change the subject. Don't allow the machine to change the
subject and it will insult you.

People --that is, people one might enjoy meeting at parties -- would
either take up the Socratic challenge or offer an explanation as to
why they are not interested in rarefied and abstract conversation at
the moment. The only people who would behave like the bots are the
sort one would not ask such questions in the first place.



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