Minds and machines

The emergence of electronic computers in the last thirty years has given rise to many interesting questions. Many of these questions are technical, relating to a machine’s ability to perform complex operations in a variety of circumstances. While some of these questions are not without philosophical interest, the one question which above all others has stimulated philosophical interest is explicitly non-technical and it can be expressed crudely as follows: Can a machine be said to think and, if so, in what sense? The issue has received much attention in the scholarly journals with articles and arguments appearing in great profusion, some resolutely answering this question in the affirmative, some, equally resolutely, answering this question in the negative, and others manifesting modified rapture. While the ramifications of the question are enormous I believe that the issue at the heart of the matter has gradually emerged from the forest of complications. It is easy to answer the question “Can machines/computers think?” Easy, that is, once we know with some degree of precision what thinking is, what machine/computers are, and, last but not least, how to understand the word “can.” The possibility of answering the question, “Can a computer think?” is rendered either question-beggingly trivial or mind-bogglingly impossible unless one is able to give some independent signification to its key terms. To define a computer as a sort of machine, and then to define machine in such a narrow way that it becomes meaningless to ask if it thinks viciously begs the question unless the definitions can be given independent justification. Of course, a similar consideration applies to arguments in favour of artificial intelligence. I assume that the majority of those who would put this question intend by “think” something like