The nervous system iscertainly not a discrete-state machine
I find this an interesting analogy. The nervous system has an all or nothing response, but he is comparing it to something that has no buffer zone that I am not sure is completely correct, however, I do not understand what he is trying to discribe the machine as.
hinking is a function of man’s immortalsoul. God has given an immortal soul to every man and woman, but not toany other animal or to machines. Hence no animal or machine can think.
I think this is an interesting perspective since at that time, many people were tied to their religious beliefs. However, I think it is kinda a double standard that he is separating humans from animals, but combining animals and machines.
One may hope, however, that this process will be more expeditious than evolu-tion. The survival of theWttest is a slow method for measuring advantages.
I find this concept very interesting. I understand how you send a child to school to fill their ‘blank slate’, but I am curious how this would work with a machine that requires active programming.
Opinions may vary as to the complexity which is suitable in the child machine.One might try to make it as simple as possible consistently with the generalprinciples. Alternatively one might have a complete system of logical inference‘built in’.
Here is a counter argument showing that many things with humans, and possibly likewise with a machine is up to perception. If it is subjective, rather than objective, it is impossible to decide if the machine really can ‘think’.
We may hope that machines will eventually compete with men in all purelyintellectualWelds.
This sentence signifies Turning hopes for the future of machines. He wants to expand the capabilities of machines so that they can be on an equal playing field with humans. This also hints to our current day artificial intelligence phenomena and debate.
The new problem has the advantage of drawing a fairly sharp line between thephysical and the intellectual capacities of a man.
I think that this is a key sentence in the essay. Here, Turning states what the challenge is in determining if machines can think and it then sets him up to describe the imitation game and how he will test his theory. He states that he will need an objective way to determine the capabilities of a machine.
I propose to consider the question, ‘Can machines think?’ This should begin withdeWnitions of the meaning of the terms ‘machine’ and ‘think’. The deWnitionsmight be framed so as to reXect so far as possible the normal use of the words,but this attitude is dangerous.
I think that this is an important sentence in how Turing sets up the question he wishes to pursue for the rest of the essay. Here he is asking “can machines think?” and then slightly setting up the reader by giving the context for his question. Also, he defines his terminology so the reader can understand the premise of what he will be exploring.