It's a good thing to check scientific claims against high standards. It would also be a good thing to hold your own reasoning to standards of the same kind. Sadly, at least three of the six arguments you're putting forward are not arguments at all. Not debating the verdict, but you should really try harder than this, Techdirt.
1. It's not a "supercomputer," it's a chatbot. It's a script made to mimic human conversation. There is no intelligence, artificial or not involved. It's just a chatbot.
- This doesn't seem very convincing. Define 'supercomputer, a virtual computer is not a computer? Also: define 'intelligence'.
2. Plenty of other chatbots have similarly claimed to have "passed" the Turing test in the past (often with higher ratings). Here's a story from three years ago about another bot, Cleverbot, "passing" the Turing Test by convincing 59% of judges it was human (much higher than the 33% Eugene Goostman) claims.
- Others passed with higher scores. How is this an argument?
3. It "beat" the Turing test here by "gaming" the rules -- by telling people the computer was a 13-year-old boy from Ukraine in order to mentally explain away odd responses. The "rules" of the Turing test always seem to change. Hell, Turing's original test was quite different anyway.
- Are you trying to say that 13 year old Ukrainians are not human beings?
4. The "rules" of the Turing test always seem to change. Hell, Turing's original test was quite different anyway.
+ I suppose this is your first real argument. Too bad you didn't take the time to be a bit more specific.
5. As Chris Dixon points out, you don't get to run a single test with judges that you picked and declare you accomplished something. That's just not how it's done. If someone claimed to have created nuclear fusion or cured cancer, you'd wait for some peer review and repeat tests under other circumstances before buying it, right?
+ Now you're talking. This is a real argument. Why isn't this on the top of the list?
6. The whole concept of the Turing Test itself is kind of a joke. While it's fun to think about, creating a chatbot that can fool humans is not really the same thing as creating artificial intelligence. Many in the AI world look on the Turing Test as a needless distraction.
- And there you go again. It didn't pass the Turing test because the Turing test is stupid?
And this is just ugly. It's not true because something else wasn't true either:
"Oh, and the biggest red flag of all. The event was organized by Kevin Warwick (..)"
Techdirt has not posted any stories submitted by robin verdegaal.
hmmm
1. It's not a "supercomputer," it's a chatbot. It's a script made to mimic human conversation. There is no intelligence, artificial or not involved. It's just a chatbot.
- This doesn't seem very convincing. Define 'supercomputer, a virtual computer is not a computer? Also: define 'intelligence'.
2. Plenty of other chatbots have similarly claimed to have "passed" the Turing test in the past (often with higher ratings). Here's a story from three years ago about another bot, Cleverbot, "passing" the Turing Test by convincing 59% of judges it was human (much higher than the 33% Eugene Goostman) claims.
- Others passed with higher scores. How is this an argument?
3. It "beat" the Turing test here by "gaming" the rules -- by telling people the computer was a 13-year-old boy from Ukraine in order to mentally explain away odd responses.
The "rules" of the Turing test always seem to change. Hell, Turing's original test was quite different anyway.
- Are you trying to say that 13 year old Ukrainians are not human beings?
4. The "rules" of the Turing test always seem to change. Hell, Turing's original test was quite different anyway.
+ I suppose this is your first real argument. Too bad you didn't take the time to be a bit more specific.
5. As Chris Dixon points out, you don't get to run a single test with judges that you picked and declare you accomplished something. That's just not how it's done. If someone claimed to have created nuclear fusion or cured cancer, you'd wait for some peer review and repeat tests under other circumstances before buying it, right?
+ Now you're talking. This is a real argument. Why isn't this on the top of the list?
6. The whole concept of the Turing Test itself is kind of a joke. While it's fun to think about, creating a chatbot that can fool humans is not really the same thing as creating artificial intelligence. Many in the AI world look on the Turing Test as a needless distraction.
- And there you go again. It didn't pass the Turing test because the Turing test is stupid?
And this is just ugly. It's not true because something else wasn't true either:
"Oh, and the biggest red flag of all. The event was organized by Kevin Warwick (..)"
Techdirt has not posted any stories submitted by robin verdegaal.
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