On Tue, Apr 23, 2013 at 3:13 PM, Craig Weinberg <[email protected]>wrote:
> > > On Tuesday, April 23, 2013 4:31:05 PM UTC-4, Brian Tenneson wrote: > >> >> >> On Tue, Apr 23, 2013 at 1:26 PM, Craig Weinberg <[email protected]>wrote: >> >>> >>> >>> Searle wasn't wrong. The whole point of the Chinese Room is to point out >>> that computation is a disconnected, anesthetic function which is >>> accomplished with no need for understanding of larger contexts. >>> >>> >> >> How do we know that what humans do is understand things rather than just >> compute things? >> > > > Because we care about what we understand, and we identify with it > personally. Understanding is used also to mean compassion. When someone > demonstrates a lack of human understanding, we say that they are behaving > robotically, like a machine, etc. Questions like, "How do you know you are > conscious?", or "How do you know that you feel?" are sophistry. How do you > know that you can ask that question? > > Sounds circular. "we do understand things because we care about what we understand." The type of understanding I was referring to was not about compassion. Why is it so strange to think that we are stuck in a big Chinese room, without really understanding anything but being adept at pushing symbols around? -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
