[extropy-chat] Turing Test was Blog spam (anti-google trivia)

[The Avantguardian]

--- spike <spike66 at comcast.net> wrote:

> The object is to ask a question
> in such a way that humans everywhere on the globe
> will 
> know the answer but google will not help a bit. 
> This 
> will stump any Turing machine.

Spike, your questions got me thinking and I have
reached the conclusion that the Turing Test is an
absurd measure for machine intelligence. The reason
for this is that it is not an intelligence test at
all, it is a cultural test. To expect a machine, no
matter how smart, to pass a culturally specific
humanocentric test is ridiculous. It would be as if an
extraterrestrial from Rigel were to base its
assessment of your intelligence on your answer to,
"What is the best method of reconditioning your
ovipositor during perihellion?"

Using some of your questions to exemplify this: 


> 1.  Game played with wooden or plastic figures
> representing
> medieval persons or objects that are moved in
> prescribed ways.

Xerxes the Persian would have answered I think you
mean "SHAH" but what is this plastic you speak of?
 
> 2.  After breakfast you often or usually do this to
> those
> shiny white objects in your head.

Leornardo da Vinci would have answered, "I rub them
with salt."  

> 3.  I have gotten so fat I can no longer touch my _
> _ _ _.

Henry the VIIIth would have answered, "WIFE". 

 
> 4.  I cannot think until I have had a hot _ _ _ of _
> _ _ _ _ _.

Archimedes would have been stumped a while then
shouted "eureka!" and answered TUB of HYDROS.
> 
> 5.  Devoured way too much of a certain liquid,
> attempted to
> drive home, got caught, now I am in _ _ _ _.

In El Salvador which is primarily catholic and drunk
driving is a capital offense punishable by summary
execution on the spot, the answer would be HELL.  
> 
> 6.  When I was a teenager all I could think about
> was _ _ _.

Alexander the Great would have answered, "WAR".

My point in all this is not to be a smart ass but to
illustrate that just as one cannot expect an aborigine
that can calculate pi to a hundred decimal places in
his head to score well on the SAT, one should not
expect an AI of even god-like intelligence to pass the
Turing test. This is because the Turing test is biased
very much toward humans, and nothing is more pathetic
than a machine that is convinced it is human. To hold
it as any standard of machine intelligence would be a
grievous insult to machina sapiens. After all, even in
Star Trek TNG, much of the comic relief was supplied
by Data failing the Turing test in humorous ways. 

The Avantguardian 
is 
Stuart LaForge
alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu

"The surest sign of intelligent life in the universe is that they haven't attempted to contact us." 
-Bill Watterson


	
		
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