Stanley Fish's What Did Watson The Computer Do?

Improved Essays
Through the years, humans have increasingly relied on computers. Humans have sought out to create technology that imitates human life. Computers are programmed by humans, and currently computers have “limitations” on their knowledge. However, even though humans and computers currently share the same knowledge, they differ greatly in the aspects of development, awareness, and interactions.
According to “Toward An Intelligence Beyond Man’s” by Robert Jastrow, it states, “Computer intelligence is growing by leaps and bounds, with no natural limit in sight. But human evolution is a nearly finished chapter in the history of life. The human brain has not changed, at least in gross size, in the past 100,000 years, and while the organization of the brain may have improved in that period, the amount of information…” (208). Computers have the ability to process multiple sources of information at
…show more content…
In “What Did Watson The Computer Do?” by Stanley Fish, it asserts: “Human beings have trouble keeping to the rules. Human beings are always thinking, “Yes, I know the rule, but surely those who crafted it would agree that in the situation I now face, it should be relaxed” or “I know the rules of this game but if I obey them slavishly…” (216). Computers on the other hand, lack this type of cognitive thinking skill. “Human thinking is a concrete biological phenomenon existing in actual human brains. This is as opposed to Watson, which is merely following an algorithm that enables it to manipulate formal symbols.” (Fish 216). Computers are unable to adapt to situations, but are only able to follow guidelines that are programmed within them. Also, computers are emotionally detached unlike humans. Humans have the ability to have feelings, react to situations in a certain way, and essentially think! “Literally speaking, there is no such thing as computer understanding. There is only simulation.” (Searle

Related Documents

  • Improved Essays

    Speaking to machines is different than speaking to people, Turkle mentions “We have built machines that speak, and, in speaking to them, we cannot help but attribute human nature to objects that have none”(Turkle 16) However, these machines do exhibit a partial human nature that can help people that need it most. Programmed machines can simulate different elements of human nature to help those who struggle. Artificial intelligence is not just used for conversation, people can now poses artificial limbs that connect to the body to help out patients that were born without them or lost due to an…

    • 1310 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    In his essay, “Computing Machinery and Intelligence,” Alan Turing poses the question, “Can machines think?” (433). Turing takes the position that machines can, indeed, think depending on how one defines thought. Although he states that he “should begin with the definitions of the meaning of the terms ‘machine’ and ‘think,’” he does not directly provide the reader with his definition of thought (433). Instead, he spends a lengthy amount of time exploring a replacement question that manifests itself in the form of the imitation game.…

    • 1676 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    In Programming The Post-Human: Computer science redefines “life,” Ellen Ullman uses captivating, argumentative, and reflective language in order to convey the complications of making an intellectual, sentient machine and explores the unanswered, unconventional questions about humans themselves to computer enthusiasts and thinkers. Her use of questions to captivate and engage readers is noteworthy. Likewise, observations, comparisons, contrasts, and analogies support to make her argument. Careful analyses, well reasoned thoughts, anecdotes, and use of metaphors attribute to her reflective way of writing. Published on Harper’s magazine, the complexity of the content of the article and its inferences have been made fairly simple so that anyone,…

    • 1212 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Sixing Jiao Dr. Tsurska Oct. 11th, 2015 SDCC 4 Smarter than You Think Summary In general, Clive Thompson claims that modern technologies can “leave us smarter even when we are not actively using them”(360). His statement about modern technologies is much more optimistic than those of other authors that we have studied. Interestingly, through out the entire article, Clive Thompson uses a clever analogy between chess and process of human thoughts to deliver his points across.…

    • 616 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    In the article ‘Smarter Than You Think,’ by Clive Thompson, the author explains the comparison of the human mind vs machine intelligence. He talks about the speed of these machines in a game of chess and the millions of calculations it can make in just seconds. Compared with humans, these machines outmatch ourselves in everything expect in one way. Thompson explains even though machines are better they have trouble with “intelligence amplification,” but when paired together the possibilities are endless. Later in the article he dives into the factors of the internet, digital devices, social media, and more.…

    • 1395 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Thus he argues that it is not clear whether the machine is acting intelligently or just trying to mimic the human thinking…

    • 542 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    89). Carr believes that the minds of humans are becoming emotionless and robotic. “As we come to rely on computers to mediate our understanding of the world, it is our own intelligence that flattens into artificial intelligence” (p. 96). Society is allowing computers to do most of the thinking for them by relying so much on its information and processing.…

    • 1618 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Over the century innovation has changed humans critical thinking. From the manual type writer to the computer the utilization of the technology, is part of our everyday activity. In the article “Is Google Making Us Stupid” by Nicholas Carr, Carr tried to express his concern, how the internet changing our lives and the thinking ability and the way our brain processes the information differently than it used to in the past. Carr explain how we don’t think and depend on quick searches, rather than taking our time to do critical thinking and researches. He tells us how our brain is malleable, and it is changing every day.…

    • 848 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Is the media and internet slowly wearing away the knowledge that we had making us totally dependable on the objects put in front of us, or could computers and media be aiding us for the better? Nicholas Carr and Clive Thompson put these broad topics into perspective by forming different opinions going in different directions. One suggesting that the internet is making us smarter, developing our intellect and guiding us in the right direction to a more successful future? The other saying that we are losing our ability to think and learn on an efficient level as we use to.…

    • 1108 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Great Essays

    In this article, Nicholas Carr discusses the negative characteristics of the internet in his essay. Is google making us stupid, but there are others who see positive aspects of the internet. The internet including google could be helping human beings brains in some ways, even though there may be some issues that exist. This paper will give a detailed explanation of the positive aspects of the internet and how it has evolved our way of life for the better. It has completely changed the way people communicate, work, learn, organize, plan and research.…

    • 1245 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Great Essays

    The wetware of the brain is in many ways inferior to the hardware of a computer and this difference of capability further divides the concepts of computing and thinking. The efficiency of thinking is not nearly as variable as the efficiency of computing. The rate at which a computer computes is determined by the quality of its core processors, the software, the amount of RAM etc. Each of these components are easily upgraded or downgraded and advancements in the fields related to the individual components are happening frequently which consistently increase the quality of computing power that exists. The rate at which someone is able to think about a particular topic is dependent on past experience in which they mostly have no control over and the DNA that they were given at birth.…

    • 1642 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Adam Gopnik

    • 514 Words
    • 3 Pages

    In Adam Gopnik's article, “Get Smart,” he effectively evaluates true smartness of the machines of modern technology. Gopnik raises some good points to support the fact that machines are currently not as witty as human. For me, the most interesting point of the article is when Gopnik notes and then goes on to explain that the machines only have good memory but they cannot react to situations for which they are not prepared. Gopnik explains that the only reason a computer system named Watson won the jeopardy is that it has a huge data base to draw answers from.…

    • 514 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    In “Can Computers Think?” John Searle claims that by definition, computers cannot think, nor will they ever, no matter how much technology manages to advance in the future. Searle defends his claim by providing an outline and an interesting thought experiment. His work begins by simply introducing the prevailing views concerning artificial intelligence during the time period. Many individuals thought of human brains and digital computers as analogous due to something known as the Turing Test.…

    • 1054 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    The limited but still incredible possibilities of AI and cyborg tech can greatly improve the lives of many people. Those who struggle with simple tasks to those who want to enhance their abilities further. Because of our advancing computer systems and our ability to create, we are able to improve the human race even further. In contrast, we still have a major downfall.…

    • 1187 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Albert Einstein once said "I fear the day when technology over laps with humanity the world will only have a generation of idiots. " Now we are in a generation where the serious problem is not whether machines think but whether men do. Easy questions like what is life? Is being googled by many.…

    • 1579 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Improved Essays