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Turing Test
Turing's proposed test for whether a machine is conscious (or intelligent, or aware): the subject communicates via text with the machine and with a hidden human. If the subject cannot tell which of their partners in the dialog is the human, then the computer is conscious (i.e. is an AI). Turing did not specify many key details, such as the duration of the interrogation and the sophistication of the human judge and foils. By the middle Information Age, computer AIs were regularly passing the test, although its validity remained a point of controversy and philosophical debate for some decades more.
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Development Notes
Text by M. Alan Kazlev based on Anders Sandberg in his Transhuman Terminology
Initially published on 09 January 2002.
Initially published on 09 January 2002.
