Path: utzoo!utgpu!watmath!clyde!att!rutgers!mailrus!ukma!gatech!linus!mbunix!bwk
From: bwk@mitre-bedford.ARPA (Barry W. Kort)
Newsgroups: comp.ai
Subject: Re: Artificial Intelligence and Intelligence
Summary: Mutations, Random Errors, Serendipity, and Turing Machines
Message-ID: <42328@linus.UUCP>
Date: 30 Nov 88 14:33:07 GMT
References: <484@soleil.UUCP> <0XTukNy00Xol41W1Ui@andrew.cmu.edu>
Sender: news@linus.UUCP
Reply-To: bwk@mbunix (Kort)
Organization: IdeaSync, Inc., Chronos, VT
Lines: 15

In article <0XTukNy00Xol41W1Ui@andrew.cmu.edu> ap1i+@andrew.cmu.edu
Andrew C. Plotkin writes:
>I maintain that a human can be simulated by a Turing machine.  Comments?

As a human being, I occasionally cast lots to choose a course of action
when my value system is balanced on the razor's edge between two
alternatives.  Because I want to be sure that my Random Number
Generator is not deterministic (like a pseudo-random sequence
generator), I use a quantum amplifier in my coin flipper.

Correct me if I'm wrong.  But a Turing Machine is obliged to follow
a deterministic program.  Hence a Turing machine cannot simulate my
dice-tossing method.

--Barry Kort