Individual Understanding
I agree with functionalists, specifically the strong Artificial Intelligence (AI) camp, concerning the concept of understanding. While John Searle poses a strong non-functionalist case in his AChinese Room@ argument, I find that his definition of Ato understand@ falls short and hampers his point. I criticize his defense that understanding rests on a standardized knowledge of meaning, but not before outlining the general background of the issue.
Functionalists define thought and mental states in terms of input and output. They claim that what we see, hear, smell, taste, and touch (input) creates a mental state or belief, and that particular mental state in turn creates our reaction ...
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that an appropriately programmed computer actually has all the same mental states and capabilities as a human. In AMinds, Brains, and Programs,@ John Searle outlines this argument:
AIt is a characteristic of human beings= story understanding capacity that they can answer questions about [a] story even though the information they give was never explicitly stated in the story. . . . [Strong AI claims that m]achines can similarly answer questions about [stories] in this fashion. . . . Partisans of strong AI claim that in this question and answer sequence the machine is not only simulating a human ability but also (1) that the machine can literally be said to understand the story . . . and (2) that what the machine and its program do explains the human ability to understand the story and answer questions about it@ (354).
While strong AI claims that a machine can understand just as a human understands, Searle himself disagrees. He claims that a strictly input-output system, such as a ...
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pieced-together responses), just as strong AI proposes. But is this understanding?
Searle claims it is not. He argues that locked in the room, he certainly does not understand Chinese. AI have inputs and outputs that are indistinguishable from those of [a] native Chinese speaker, and I can have any formal program you like, but I still understand nothing. For the same reason,@ Searle claims, A[strong AI=s] computer understands nothing of any stories . . .@ He goes on to argue that with English sentences, he knows what they mean, and therefore understands them, but with the Chinese symbols, he knows nothing of their meaning and therefore does not understand them (357).
One of the ...
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Individual Understanding. (2005, October 3). Retrieved December 23, 2024, from http://www.essayworld.com/essays/Individual-Understanding/34275
"Individual Understanding." Essayworld.com. Essayworld.com, 3 Oct. 2005. Web. 23 Dec. 2024. <http://www.essayworld.com/essays/Individual-Understanding/34275>
"Individual Understanding." Essayworld.com. October 3, 2005. Accessed December 23, 2024. http://www.essayworld.com/essays/Individual-Understanding/34275.
"Individual Understanding." Essayworld.com. October 3, 2005. Accessed December 23, 2024. http://www.essayworld.com/essays/Individual-Understanding/34275.
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