My favorite response to the Chinese Room argument:
An exactly parallel argument to [Searle’s] would be that the behavior of H2O molecules can never explain the liquidity of water, because if we entered into the system of molecules … we should only find on visiting it pieces which push one against another, but never anything by which to explain liquidity. But in both cases we would be looking at the system at the wrong level. The liquidity of water is not to be found at the level of the individual molecule, nor is the [understanding of Chinese] to be found at the level of the individual neuron or synapse.
Yes, this rebuttal is simple, straightforward, and I daresay obvious. The reason it’s remarkable is who made it: a certain John Searle (about Leibniz’s thought experiment involving a mill, essentially identical to the much later Chinese room).
I’m actually not sure I agree with the specifics of that response: water molecules have attractive forces towards each other (such as hydrogen bonding) as well as repulsive ones, and that does in fact explain both the hardness of ice and the surface tension of water that holds it together as a liquid rather than a vapor at room temperature. But I am amused by the irony you point out.
My favorite response to the Chinese Room argument:
An exactly parallel argument to [Searle’s] would be that the behavior of H2O molecules can never explain the liquidity of water, because if we entered into the system of molecules … we should only find on visiting it pieces which push one against another, but never anything by which to explain liquidity. But in both cases we would be looking at the system at the wrong level. The liquidity of water is not to be found at the level of the individual molecule, nor is the [understanding of Chinese] to be found at the level of the individual neuron or synapse.
Yes, this rebuttal is simple, straightforward, and I daresay obvious. The reason it’s remarkable is who made it: a certain John Searle (about Leibniz’s thought experiment involving a mill, essentially identical to the much later Chinese room).
I’m actually not sure I agree with the specifics of that response: water molecules have attractive forces towards each other (such as hydrogen bonding) as well as repulsive ones, and that does in fact explain both the hardness of ice and the surface tension of water that holds it together as a liquid rather than a vapor at room temperature. But I am amused by the irony you point out.