The Computer Revolution/Artificial Intelligence/Turing Test

The Turing Test

- The Turing test answers the question " do computers have or have computers achieved human intelligence"

Alan Turing, the creator of the Turing test, predicted that by the end of the century, computers would mimic human thinking. Alan, a mathematician at the time ( 1950 ) stated that it would be impossible to tell if a conversation with a computer could be distinguishable from conversation with a person.

In most examples the test works as follows:

1. human being(1) typing responses to human being(2) questions or queries

2. computer program providing other responses to same human being(2) questions or quieres

3. now both human being (1) and the computer program are not in eye site of human being (2) so that human being (2) has no visual reference of which source ( human (1) or computer ) is providing the reference.

4. the point of the test is to answer the question above "do computers have or have computers achieved human intelligence" 5. if the human being (2) is unable to determine which source responding to him is either human or computer, this demostrates the computers ability to hold human intelligence.

The Loebner Prize

In 1990, Dr. Hugh Loebner introduced a contest designed to implement the Turing Test. He offered to award a prize of $100,000 and a bronze medal to the computer that could “think” like a human and could be considered artificially intelligent. Each year an annual contest is held and a prize of $2000 and a bronze medal is awarded to the program that responds with the most “human-like” responses. So there is a winner every year, but to date, the gold medal has never been awarded. Parker, D. M. (2011). Understanding Computers: Today and Tomorrow. Boston, MA: Course Technology. Cengage Learning.