Home > Terms > English, UK (UE) > Chinese room
Chinese room
A thought experiment developed by John Searle. It attempts to show that computers cannot 'understand' things in the same way that humans do, instead, they just carry out commands in a way that appears intelligent.
The experiment says that a person is put in a room containing a book in English that lists all the steps a computer undergoes to carry out a conversation in Chinese with a native speaker, as well as paper and other materials. The person receives Chinese characters through a hole in the door, and by following the instructions given in the book, eventually returns a reply in Chinese. Despite being able to reply (albeit slowly) in Chinese, the person inside the room cannot be said to actually understand any Chinese.
Searle argues that computers essentially follow this same pattern, mindlessly following an algorithm to give an answer, and so they too cannot be said to understand anything.
- Part of Speech: noun
- Synonym(s):
- Blossary:
- Industry/Domain: Computer
- Category: Computer science
- Company:
- Product:
- Acronym-Abbreviation:
Other Languages:
Member comments
Terms in the News
Featured Terms
Narendra Modi
Narendra Modi is India's next prime minister who will be sworn on 26 May 2014. He's been leader of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and since 2001 a ...
Contributor
Featured blossaries
Browers Terms By Category
- Journalism(537)
- Newspaper(79)
- Investigative journalism(44)
News service(660) Terms
- Capacitors(290)
- Resistors(152)
- Switches(102)
- LCD Panels(47)
- Power sources(7)
- Connectors(7)
Electronic components(619) Terms
- World history(1480)
- Israeli history(1427)
- American history(1149)
- Medieval(467)
- Nazi Germany(442)
- Egyptian history(242)
History(6037) Terms
- Organic chemistry(2762)
- Toxicology(1415)
- General chemistry(1367)
- Inorganic chemistry(1014)
- Atmospheric chemistry(558)
- Analytical chemistry(530)
Chemistry(8305) Terms
- Investment banking(1768)
- Personal banking(1136)
- General banking(390)
- Mergers & acquisitions(316)
- Mortgage(171)
- Initial public offering(137)