Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Minds, Machines and Turing

  • Published:
Journal of Logic, Language and Information Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Turing's celebrated 1950 paper proposes a very generalmethodological criterion for modelling mental function: total functionalequivalence and indistinguishability. His criterion gives rise to ahierarchy of Turing Tests, from subtotal (“toy”) fragments of ourfunctions (t1), to total symbolic (pen-pal) function (T2 – the standardTuring Test), to total external sensorimotor (robotic) function (T3), tototal internal microfunction (T4), to total indistinguishability inevery empirically discernible respect (T5). This is a“reverse-engineering” hierarchy of (decreasing) empiricalunderdetermination of the theory by the data. Level t1 is clearly toounderdetermined, T2 is vulnerable to a counterexample (Searle's ChineseRoom Argument), and T4 and T5 are arbitrarily overdetermined. Hence T3is the appropriate target level for cognitive science. When it isreached, however, there will still remain more unanswerable questionsthan when Physics reaches its Grand Unified Theory of Everything (GUTE),because of the mind/body problem and the other-minds problem, both ofwhich are inherent in this empirical domain, even though Turing hardlymentions them.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Alcock, J.E., 1987, “Parapsychology: Science of the anomalous or search for the soul?,” Behavioral and Brain Sciences 10, 553–565.

    Google Scholar 

  • Black, M., 1952, “The identity of indiscernibles,” Mind 61, 152–164.

    Google Scholar 

  • Crockett, L., 1994, The Turing Test and the Frame Problem: AI's Mistaken Understanding of Intelligence, Norwood, NJ: Ablex.

    Google Scholar 

  • Davidson, D., 1990, “Turing's Test,” pp. 1–11 in Modelling the Mind, K.A. Mohyeldin Said, W.H. Newton-Smith, R. Viale, and K.V. Wilkes, eds., Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dennett, D., 1985, “Can machines think?,” in How We Know, M. Shafto, ed., San Francisco, CA: Harper & Row.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dennett, D.C., 1994, “Cognitive science as reverse engineering,” pp. 679–689 in Proceedings of the 9th International Congress of Logic, Methodology and Philosophy of Science, D. Prawitz, B. Skyrms, and D. Westerstahl, eds., Amsterdam: North-Holland.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dennett, D.C. and Kinsbourne, M., 1995, “Time and the observer: The where and when of consciousness in the brain,” Behavioral and Brain Sciences 15, 183–247.

    Google Scholar 

  • French, R., 1990, “Subcognition and the limits of the Turing Test,” Mind 99, 53–65.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hadamard, J., 1949, An Essay on the Psychology of Invention in the Mathematical Field, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Harnad, S., 1982a, “Neoconstructivism: A unifying theme for the cognitive sciences,” pp. 1–11 in Language, Mind and Brain, T. Simon and R. Scholes, eds., Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.

    Google Scholar 

  • Harnad, S., 1982b, “Consciousness: An afterthought,” Cognition and Brain Theory 5, 29–47.

    Google Scholar 

  • Harnad, S., 1984, “Verifying machines' minds (Review of J.T. Culbertson, Consciousness: Natural and artificial, NY: Libra 1982),” Contemporary Psychology 29, 389–391.

    Google Scholar 

  • Harnad, S., 1985, “Bugs, slugs, computers and consciousness,” American Psychologist 73, 21.

    Google Scholar 

  • Harnad, S., 1989, “Minds, machines and Searle,” Journal of Theoretical and Experimental Artificial Intelligence 1, 5–25.

    Google Scholar 

  • Harnad, S., 1990a, “The symbol grounding problem,” Physica D 42, 335–346.

    Google Scholar 

  • Harnad, S., 1990b, “Against computational hermeneutics (Invited Commentary on Eric Dietrich's Computationalism),” Social Epistemology 4, 167–172.

    Google Scholar 

  • Harnad, S., 1990c, “Lost in the hermeneutic hall of mirrors. Invited Commentary on: Michael Dyer: Minds, Machines, Searle and Harnad,” Journal of Experimental and Theoretical Artificial Intelligence 2, 321–327.

    Google Scholar 

  • Harnad, S., 1991, “Other bodies, other minds: A machine incarnation of an old philosophical problem,” Minds and Machines 1, 43–54.

    Google Scholar 

  • Harnad, S., 1992a, “Connecting object to symbol in modeling cognition,” pp. 75–90 in Connectionism in Context, A. Clark and R. Lutz, eds., Berlin: Springer-Verlag.

    Google Scholar 

  • Harnad, S., 1992b, “The Turing test is not a trick: Turing indistinguishability is a scientific criterion,” SIGART Bulletin 3 9–10.

    Google Scholar 

  • Harnad, S., 1993a, “Grounding symbols in the analog world with neural nets,” Think 2, 12–78 (Special issue on “Connectionism versus Symbolism,” D.M.W. Powers and P.A. Flach, eds.).

  • Harnad, S., 1993b, “Artificial life: Synthetic versus virtual,” pp. 539–549 in Artificial Life III, Proceedings, C. Langton, ed., Santa Fe Institute Studies in the Sciences of Complexity, Vol. XVI, Reading, MA: Addison Wesley.

    Google Scholar 

  • Harnad S., 1993c, “Discussion (passim),” in Experimental and Theoretical Studies of Consciousness, G.R. Bock and J. Marsh, eds., CIBA Foundation Symposium 174, Chichester: Wiley.

    Google Scholar 

  • Harnad, S., 1994a, “Levels of functional equivalence in reverse bioengineering: The Darwinian Turing test for artificial life,” Artificial Life 1, 293–301. Reprinted in C.G. Langton, ed., 1995, Artificial Life: An Overview, Cambridge, MA:MIT Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Harnad, S., 1994b, “Computation is just interpretable symbol manipulation: Cognition isn't,” Minds and Machines 4, 379–390 (Special Issue on “What Is Computation”).

    Google Scholar 

  • Harnad, S., 1995a, Does the mind piggy-back on robotic and symbolic capacity?,” pp. 204–220 in The Mind, the Brain, and Complex Adaptive Systems, H. Morowitz, ed., Santa Fe Institute Studies in the Sciences of Complexity, Vol. XXII, Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley.

    Google Scholar 

  • Harnad, S., 1995b, “Why and how we are not zombies,” Journal of Consciousness Studies 1, 164–167.

    Google Scholar 

  • Harnad, S., 1996, “The origin of words: A psychophysical hypothesis,” pp. 27–44 in Communicating Meaning: Evolution and Development of Language, B. Velichkovsky and D. Rumbaugh, eds., Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.

    Google Scholar 

  • Harnad, S., 2000a, “Turing indistinguishability and the blind watchmaker,” in Evolving Consciousness, G. Mulhauser, ed., Amsterdam: John Benjamins (in press).

    Google Scholar 

  • Harnad, S., 2000b, “What's wrong and right about Searle's Chinese Room argument?,” in Essays on Searle's Chinese Room Argument, M. Bishop and J. Preston, eds., Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Harnad, S., 2000c, “Correlation vs. causality: How/why the mind/body problem is hard,” Journal of Consciousness Studies 7, 54–61.

    Google Scholar 

  • Harnad, S., Doty, R.W., Goldstein, L., Jaynes, J., and Krauthamer, G., eds., 1977, Lateralization in the Nervous System, New York: Academic Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hauser, L., 1993, “Reaping the whirlwind: Reply to Harnad's 'Other bodies, other minds',” Minds and Machines 3, 219–237.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hayes, P., Harnad, S., Perlis, D., and Block, N., 1992, “Virtual symposium on virtual mind,” Minds and Machines 2, 217–238.

    Google Scholar 

  • Heyes, C.M., 1998, “Theory of mind in nonhuman primates,” Behavioral and Brain Sciences 21, 101–134.

    Google Scholar 

  • Loebner, H.G., 1994, “Lessons from a restricted turing test-In response,” Communications of the ACM 37(6), 79–82.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mitchell, R.W. and Anderson, J.R., 1998, “Primate theory of mind is a Turing test,” Behavioral and Brain Sciences 21, 127–128.

    Google Scholar 

  • Nagel, T., 1974, “What is it like to be a bat?,” Philosophical Review 83, 435–451.

    Google Scholar 

  • Newell, A., 1980, “Physical symbol systems,” Cognitive Science 4, 135–183.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pylyshyn, Z.W., 1980, “Computation and cognition: Issues in the foundations of cognitive science,” Behavioral and Brain Sciences 3, 111–169.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pylyshyn, Z.W., 1984, Computation and Cognition, Cambridge, MA: MIT/Bradford.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pylyshyn, Z.W., ed., 1987, The Robot's Dilemma: The Frame Problem in Artificial Intelligence, Norwood NJ: Ablex.

    Google Scholar 

  • Schweizer, P., 1998, “The truly total Turing test,” Minds and Machines 8, 263–272.

    Google Scholar 

  • Searle, J.R., 1980, “Minds, brains, and programs,” Behavioral and Brain Sciences 3, 417–457.

    Google Scholar 

  • Searle, J.R., 1984, Minds, Brains and Science, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Searle, J.R., 1990, “Consciousness, explanatory inversion, and cognitive science,” Behavioral and Brain Sciences 13, 585–642.

    Google Scholar 

  • Searle, J.R., 1993, “The failures of computationalism,” THINK 2, 70–77.

    Google Scholar 

  • Shieber, S.M., 1994, “Lessons from a restricted Turing test,” Communications of the ACM 37, 70–78.

    Google Scholar 

  • Steklis, H.D. and Harnad, S., 1976, “From hand to mouth: Some critical stages in the evolution of language,” pp. 445–455 in Origins and Evolution of Language and Speech, S. Harnad, H.D. Steklis, and J.B. Lancaster, eds., Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, Vol. 280, New York: New York Academy of Sciences.

    Google Scholar 

  • Turing, A.M., 1950, “Computing machinery and intelligence,” Mind 49, 433–460. (Reprinted in A. Anderson, ed., 1964, Minds and Machines, Engelwood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.) Watt, S., 1996, “Naive psychology and the inverted Turing test,” PSYCOLOQUY 7.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wimsatt,W.K., 1954, The Verbal Icon: Studies in the Meaning of Poetry, Louisville: University Press of Kentucky.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Electronics and Computer Science, University of Southampton, Highfield, Southampton, SO17 1BJ, U.K.

    S. Harnad

Authors
  1. S. Harnad
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Harnad, S. Minds, Machines and Turing. Journal of Logic, Language and Information 9, 425–445 (2000). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1008315308862

Download citation

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1008315308862

Search

Navigation