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The original question, 'Can machines think?' I believe to be too meaningless to deserve discussion.

Alan Turing

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Alan Turing
Age: 41 †
Born: 1912
Born: June 23
Died: 1954
Died: June 7
Artificial Intelligence Researcher
Computer Scientist
Cryptographer
Logician
Marathon Runner
Mathematician
Statistician
University Teacher
Warrington Lodge Medical and Surgery Home for Ladies
Alan M. Turing
Alan Mathieson Turing
Turing
Alan Mathison Turing
Originals
Original
Machines
Deserve
Question
Believe
Think
Meaningless
Thinking
Discussion

More quotes by Alan Turing

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Instruction tables will have to be made up by mathematicians with computing experience and perhaps a certain puzzle-solving ability. There need be no real danger of it ever becoming a drudge, for any processes that are quite mechanical may be turned over to the machine itself.
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No, I'm not interested in developing a powerful brain. All I'm after is just a mediocre brain, something like the President of the American Telephone and Telegraph Company.
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My little computer said such a funny thing this morning.
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One day ladies will take their computers for walks in the park and tell each other, My little computer said such a funny thing this morning.
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Unless in communicating with it one says exactly what one means, trouble is bound to result.
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A very large part of space-time must be investigated, if reliable results are to be obtained.
Alan Turing
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When we want to sink a convoy, we send out an observation plane first... Of course, to observe is not its real duty, we already know exactly where the convoy is. Its real duty is to be observed...Then, when we come round and sink them, the Germans will not find it suspicious.
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These disturbing phenomena [Extra Sensory Perception] seem to deny all our scientific ideas. How we should like to discredit them! Unfortunately the statistical evidence, at least for telepathy, is overwhelming.
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Up to a point, it is better to just let the snags [bugs] be there than to spend such time in design that there are none.
Alan Turing
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Machines take me by surprise with great frequency.
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Mathematical reasoning may be regarded.
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We can only see a short distance ahead, but we can see plenty there that needs to be done.
Alan Turing
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If a machine is expected to be infallible, it cannot also be intelligent.
Alan Turing
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The Exclusion Principle is laid down purely for the benefit of the electrons themselves, who might be corrupted (and become dragons or demons) if allowed to associate too freely.
Alan Turing
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A man provided with paper, pencil, and rubber, and subject to strict discipline, is in effect a universal machine.
Alan Turing
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Instead of trying to produce a programme to simulate the adult mind, why not rather try to produce one which simulates the child's? If this were then subjected to an appropriate course of education one would obtain the adult brain.
Alan Turing
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I believe that at the end of the century the use of words and general educated opinion will have altered so much that one will be able to speak of machines thinking without expecting to be contradicted.
Alan Turing
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A computer would deserve to be called intelligent if it could deceive a human into believing that it was human.
Alan Turing
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In attempting to construct such (artificially intelligent) machines we should not be irreverently usurping His (God's) power of creating souls, any more than we are in the procreation of children,” Turing had advised. “Rather we are, in either case, instruments of His will providing mansions for the souls that He creates.
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Do you know why people like violence? It is because it feels good. Humans find violence deeply satisfying. But remove the satisfaction, and the act becomes hollow.
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