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AI Philosophy:
Computers and Their Limits
G51IAI – Introduction to AI
Andrew Parkes
http://www.cs.nott.ac.uk/~ajp/
Natural Questions
• Can a computer only have a limited
intelligence? or maybe none at all?
• Are there any limits to what
computers can do?
• What is a “computer” anyway?
Turing Test
• The test is conducted with two people and a machine.
• One person plays the role of an interrogator and is in a
separate room from the machine and the other person.
• The interrogator only knows the person and machine as
A and B. The interrogator does not know which is the
person and which is the machine.
• Using a teletype, the interrogator, can ask A and B any
question he/she wishes. The aim of the interrogator is
to determine which is the person and which is the
machine.
• The aim of the machine is to fool the interrogator into
thinking that it is a person.
• If the machine succeeds then we can conclude that
machines can think.
Turing Test: Modern
• You’re on the internet and open a chat line
(modern teletype) to two others “A” and “B”
• Out of A and B
– one is a person
– one is a machine trying to imitate a person (e.g. capable of
discussing the X-factor?)
• If you can’t tell the difference then the
machine must be intelligent
• Or at least act intelligent?
Turing Test
• Often “forget” the second person
• Informally, the test is whether the
“machine” behaves like it is
intelligent
• This is a test of behaviour
• It is does not ask “does the
machine really think?”
Turing Test Objections
• It is too culturally specific?
– If B had never heard of “The X-Factor”
then does it preclude intelligence?
– What if B only speaks Romanian?
– Think about this issue!
• It tests only behaviour not real
intelligence?
Chinese Room
• The system comprises:
– a human, who only understands English
– a rule book, written in English
– two stacks of paper.
• One stack of paper is blank.
• The other has indecipherable symbols on them.
• In computing terms
– the human is the CPU
– the rule book is the program
– the two stacks of paper are storage devices.
• The system is housed in a room that is totally sealed
with the exception of a small opening.
Chinese Room: Process
• The human sits inside the room waiting for pieces of
paper to be pushed through the opening.
• The pieces of paper have indecipherable symbols
written upon them.
• The human has the task of matching the symbols from
the "outside" with the rule book.
• Once the symbol has been found the instructions in the
rule book are followed.
– may involve writing new symbols on blank pieces of paper,
– or looking up symbols in the stack of supplied symbols.
• Eventually, the human will write some symbols onto one
of the blank pieces of paper and pass these out through
the opening.
Chinese Room: Summary
• Simple Rule processing system but
in which the “rule processor”
happens to be intelligent but has
no understanding of the rules
• The set of rules might be very large
• But this is philosophy and so
ignore the practical issues
Searle’s Claim
• We have a system that is capable of
passing the Turing Test and is therefore
intelligent according to Turing.
• But the system does not understand
Chinese as it just comprises a rule book
and stacks of paper which do not
understand Chinese.
• Therefore, running the right program
does not necessarily generate
understanding.
Replies to Searle
• The Systems Reply
• The Robot Reply
• The Brain Simulator Reply
Blame the System!
• The Systems Reply states that the
system as a whole understands.
• Searle responds that the system
could be internalised into a brain
and yet the person would still
claim not to understand chinese
“Make Data”?
• The Robot Reply argues we could
internalise everything inside a
robot (android) so that it appears
like a human.
• Searle argues that nothing has
been achieved by adding motors
and perceptual capabilities.
Brain-in-a-Vat
• The Brain Simulator Reply argues we
could write a program that simulates
the brain (neurons firing etc.)
• Searle argues we could emulate the
brain using a series of water pipes and
valves. Can we now argue that the
water pipes understand? He claims not.
AI Terminology
• “Weak AI”
– machine can possibly act intelligently
• “Strong AI”
– machines can actually think intelligently
• AIMA: “Most AI researchers take the weak
hypothesis for granted, and don’t care about
the strong AI hypothesis”
(Chap. 26. p. 947)
• What is your opinion?
What is a computer?
• In discussions of
“Can a computer be intelligent?”
• Do we need to specify the “type” of
the computer?
– Does the architecture matter?
• Matters in practice: need a fast
machine, lots of memory, etc
• But does it matter “in theory”?
Turing Machine
• A very simple computing device
– storage: a tape on which one can
read/write symbols from a list
– processing: a “finite state automaton”
Turing Machine: Storage
• Storage: a tape on which one can
read/write symbols from some
fixed alphabet
– tape is of unbounded length
• you never run out of tape
– have the options to
• move to next “cell” of the tape
• read/write a symbol
Turing Machine: Processing
• “finite state automaton”
– The processor can has a fixed finite
number of internal states
– there are “transition rules” that take the
current symbol from the tape and tell it
• what to write
• whether to move the head left or right
• which state to go to next
Turing Machine Equivalences
• The set of tape symbols does not
matter!
• If you have a Turing machine that uses
one alphabet, then you can convert it to
use another alphabet by changing the
FSA properly
• Might as well just use binary 0,1 for the
tape alphabet
Universal Turing Machine
• This is fixed machine that can
simulate any other Turing machine
– the “program” for the other TM is written
on the tape
– the UTM then reads the program and
executes it
• C.f. on any computer we can write
a “DOS emulator” and so read a
program from a “.exe” file
Church-Turing Hypothesis
“All methods of computing can be performed
on a Universal Turing Machine (UTM)”
• Many “computers” are equivalent to a UTM and
hence all equivalent to each other
• Based on the observation that
– when someone comes up with a new method of computing
– then it always has turned out that a UTM can simulate it,
– and so it is no more powerful than a UTM
Church-Turing Hypothesis
• If you run an algorithm on one computer then
you can get it to work on any other
– as long as have enough time and space then computers can
all emulate each other
– an operating system of 2070 will still be able to run a 1980’s
.exe file
• Implies that abstract philosophical discussions
of AI can ignore the actual hardware?
– or maybe not? (see the Penrose argument later!)
Does a Computer have any
known limits?
• Would like to answer:
“Does a computer have any limit on
intelligence?”
• Simpler to answer
“Does a computer have any limits on
what it can compute?”
– e.g. ask the question of whether certain classes of
program can exist in principle
– best-known example uses program termination:
Program Termination
• Prog 1:
i=2 ; while ( i >= 0 ) { i++; }
• Prog 2:
i=2 ; while ( i <= 10 ) { i++; }
• Prog 1 never halts(?)
• Prog 2 halts
Program Termination
• Determining program termination
• Decide whether or not a program –
with some given input – will
eventually stop
– would seem to need intelligence?
– would exhibit intelligence?
Halting Problem
• SPECIFICATION: HALT-CHECKER
• INPUT:
1) the code for a program P
2) an input I
• OUTPUT: determine whether or not P halts eventually
when given input I
return true if “P halts on I”,
false if it never halts
• HALT-CHECKER itself must always halt eventually
– i.e. it must always be able to answer true/false to “P halts on I”
Halting Problem
• SPECIFICATION: HALT-CHECKER
• INPUT:
the code for a program P, and an input I
• OUTPUT: true if “P halts on I”, false otherwise
• HALT-CHECKER could merely “run” P on I?
• If “P halts on I” then eventually it will return
true; but what if “P loops on I”?
• BUT cannot wait forever to say it fails to halt!
• Maybe we can detect all the loop states?
Halting Problem
• TURING RESULT: HALT-CHECKER (HC) cannot
be programmed on a standard computer
(Turing Machine)
– it is “noncomputable”
• Proof: Create a program by “feeding HALTCHECKER to itself” and deriving a
contradiction (you do not need to know the
proof)
• IMPACT: A solid mathematical result that a
certain kind of program cannot exist
Other Limits?
• “Physical System Symbol
Hypothesis” is basically
– “a symbol-pushing system can be
intelligent”
• For the “symbol manipulation” let’s
consider a “formal system”:
“Formal System”
Consists of
• Axioms
•
– statements taken as true within the system
Inference rules
– rules used to derive new statements from the axioms and from other
derived statements
Classic Example:
• Axioms:
•
•
– All men are mortal
– Socrates is a man
Inference Rule:
“if something is holds ‘for all X’ then it hold for any one X”
Derive
– Socrates is mortal
Limits of Formal Systems
• Systems can do logic
• They have the potential to act
(be?) intelligent
• What can we do with “formal
systems”?
“Theorem Proving”
• Bertrand Russell & Alfred Whitehead
• Principia Mathematica 1910-13
• Attempts to derive all mathematical
truths from axioms and inference rules
• Presumption was that
– all mathematics is just
• set up the reasoning
• then “turn the handle”
• Presumption was destroyed by Gödel:
Kurt Gödel
• Logician, 1906-1978
• 1931,
Incompleteness results
• 1940s,
“invented time travel”
– demonstrated existence of
"rotating universes“, solutions
to Einstein's general relativity
with paths for which ..
– “on doing the loop you arrive
back before you left”
• Died of malnutrition
Gödel's Theorem (1931)
Applies to systems that are:
• formal:
– proof is by means of axioms and inference rules following
some mechanical set of rules
– no external “magic”
• “consistent”
– there is no statement X for which we can prove both X and
“not X”
• powerful enough to at least do arithmetic
– the system has to be able to reason about the natural
numbers 0,1,2,…
Gödel's Theorem (1931)
In consistent formal systems that include arithmetic then
“There are statements that are true but the formal system
cannot prove”
• Note: it states the proof does not exist, not merely that
we cannot find one
• Very few people understand this theorem properly
– I’m not one of them 
– I don’t expect you to understand it either! …
– just be aware of its existence as a known limit of what one can do
with one kind of “symbol manipulation”
Lucas/Penrose Claims
• Book: “Emperor's New Mind” 1989
Roger Penrose, Oxford Professor, Mathematics
• (Similar arguments also came from Lucas,
1960s)
• Inspired by Gödel’s Theorem:
– Can create a statement that they can see is true in a
system, but that cannot be shown to be true within the
system
• Claim: we are able to show something that is
true but that a Turing Machine would not be
able to show
• Claim: this demonstrates that the human is
doing something a computer can never do
• Generated a lot of controversy!!
Penrose Argument
• Based on the logic of the Gödel’s Theorem
• That there are things humans do that a
computer cannot do
• That humans do this because of physical
processes within the brain that are
noncomputable, i.e. that cannot be simulated
by a computer
– compare to “brain in a vat” !?
• Hypothesis: quantum mechanical processes
are responsible for the intelligence
• Many (most?) believe that this argument is
wrong
Penrose Argument
• Some physical processes within the brain
are noncomputable, i.e. cannot be
simulated by a computer (UTM)
• These processes contribute to our
intelligence
• Hypothesis: quantum mechanical and
quantum gravity processes are responsible
for the intelligence (!!)
• (Many believe that this argument is wrong)
One Reply to Penrose
• Humans are not consistent and so
Gödel's theorem does not apply
• Penrose Response:
– In the end, people are consistent
– E.g. one mathematician might make mistakes, but
in the end the mathematical community is
consistent and so the theorem applies
Summary
• Church-Turing Hypothesis
– all known computers are equivalent in power
– a simple Turing Machine can run anything we can program
• Physical Symbol Hypothesis
– intelligence is just symbol pushing
• There are known limits on “symbol-pushing” computers
– halting problem, Gödel’s theorem
• Penrose-Lucas: we can do things symbol pushing
computers can’t
– Some “Turing Tests” will be failed by a computer
– Some tasks cannot be performed by a “Chinese room”
– but the argument is generally held to be in error
Questions?