The original question, 'Can machines think?' I believe to be too meaningless to deserve discussion.

The original question, 'Can machines think?' I believe to be too meaningless to deserve discussion.

A man provided with paper, pencil, and rubber, and subject to strict discipline, is in effect a universal machine.

If a machine is expected to be infallible, it cannot also be intelligent.

Unless in communicating with it one says exactly what one means, trouble is bound to result.

We may hope that machines will eventually compete with men in all purely intellectual fields.

I am not very impressed with theological arguments whatever they may be used to support. Such arguments have often been found unsatisfactory in the past. In the time of Galileo it was argued that the texts, 'And the sun stood still... and hasted not to go down about a whole day' (Joshua x. 13) and 'He laid the foundations of the earth, that it should not move at any time' (Psalm cv. 5) were an adequate refutation of the Copernican theory.