Abstract:
The proper treatment of computationalism,
as the thesis that cognition is computable, is presented and defended.
Some arguments
of
James H.
Fetzer
against computationalism are examined
and found wanting, and his positive theory of minds as semiotic
systems is shown to be consistent with computationalism. An objection
is raised to an
argument of
Selmer Bringsjord
against one strand of computationalism,
viz., that Turing-Test-passing artifacts are persons; it
is argued that, whether or not this objection holds, such artifacts
will inevitably be persons.
Reprinted, with corrections, in
Martin Davis (ed.),
The Undecidable:
Basic Papers on Undecidable Propositions, Unsolvable Problems
and Computable Functions
(New York: Raven Press, 1965): 116-154.
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