Submitted by T-Bo on Fri, 02/22/2008 - 11:05.
I found it really interesting how some users of ELIZA actually believed it to be a real person, despite the technological limitations of its programming and the fact that its users were INFORMED of the fact of its artificiality. I remember using ELIZA one time in the Orlando Science Center, and I found it comprehensively limited (and pretty funny as well). I've heard that there are additional, more sophisticated interpreters exist currently, but I haven't tried them myself. In any case, the fact that the creator eventually defected to the cause of warning against artificial intelligence is a very intriguing concept--a concept that brings to mind ideas of old science fiction movies, such as "The Terminator", "A.I.", and "2001: A Space Odyssey". I, however, personally consider it impossible for artificial intelligence to reach the complexities of the human psyche, as it would be impossible to engineer a program to produce such emulation without an adequate understanding of the inner workings of the human brain. read more »
