Filed in archive Information About , Turing Test on July 14, 2010

Who did you talk with - human or machine?

© Bernt Rostad

If you have an interest in artificial intelligence then you will have heard about the Turing test. Alan Mathison Turing (1912-1954) was a British mathematician who is considered to be one of the main developers of what became modern computer systems. Working as a cryptographer during the Second World War, he developed methods to break German codes.

He developed the Turing hypothesis and machines. Turing was a genius when it came to algorithms and he developed a machine to simulate computer algorithms.

Turing machines:

To help computer scientists understand the limits of mechanical computation.

I recently took part in a Turning machine experiment though I am not really sure what my test added to science. The aim of the test is for the user to enter into an online conversation, via typed input, and then indicate if they thought they were talking with a human or a machine.

I opted for machine, though it could have been a human trying to act like a machine.

Ultimately, Turing believed that computers would be able to think for themselves and the Turing tests must provide scientists with information they can use - somehow. I am not sure how relevant it all is but it has made me interested enough to want to do some more reading.

Do I believe that computers will be able to think for themselves in the future? Yes. I think science is constantly crossing boundaries once thought impossible, a thinking computer is well within reach.