I believe that in about fifty years time it will be possible to programme computers with a storage capacity of about 109 to make them play the imitation game so well that an average interrogator will not have more than 70 per cent chance of making the right identification after five minutes of questioning. The original question, 'Can machines think?' I believe to be too meaningless to deserve discussion. Nevertheless I believe that at the end of the century the use of words and general educated opinion will have altered so much that one will be able to speak of machines thinking without expecting to be contradicted. — A. Turing, Computing Machinery and Intelligence, 1950.

  1. AI: Philosophy and ethics — Read section 7. (For a deeper discussion, see AIMA Chapters 26-27.)

    1. What are the basic philosophical questions regarding AI?

  2. Alan Turing’s “Computing Machinery and Intelligence” — Read Sections 1–3; 6–7, skimming the “contrary” arguments to get their basic thesis.

    1. What actual, operational question does Turing address in the paper?
    2. Find Turing’s prediction on machine intelligence (quoted above) in the article and consider whether or not he was correct.
    3. Specify the rules of the imitation game and how Turing proposes to apply it to machine intelligence.
    4. Do any of Turing’s “contrary” views seem compelling to you?
    5. Does Turing give any prescriptions for how one might program a computer to learn?

    For further reading, Sections 4–5 give a review of computers and Turing machines.

  3. John Searl’s Chinese room (Introduction and Sections 1–3)

    1. What is Searl’s basic argument as it relates to the Turing test?
    2. Describe the relationship of the argument to functionalism and to computationalism.
    3. Compare and contrast strong vs. weak AI.