
The Chatbot That's Acing the Largest Turing Test in History - gpresot
http://nautil.us/issue/52/the-hive/your-next-new-best-friend-might-be-a-robot-rp
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philipkglass
It's possible to lower human expectations to the point that current chatbots
can satisfy them. That's a much easier task than raising chatbots up to the
point that they can actually hold their own in probing, intelligent
conversations without prevarication, as in the original proposal:

[http://www.loebner.net/Prizef/TuringArticle.html](http://www.loebner.net/Prizef/TuringArticle.html)

 _Interrogator: In the first line of your sonnet which reads "Shall I compare
thee to a summer's day," would not "a spring day" do as well or better?

Witness: It wouldn't scan.

Interrogator: How about "a winter's day," That would scan all right.

Witness: Yes, but nobody wants to be compared to a winter's day.

Interrogator: Would you say Mr. Pickwick reminded you of Christmas?

Witness: In a way.

Interrogator: Yet Christmas is a winter's day, and I do not think Mr. Pickwick
would mind the comparison.

Witness: I don't think you're serious. By a winter's day one means a typical
winter's day, rather than a special one like Christmas._

I suppose that cobbling together enough evasions and simulated mood swings to
_bypass_ the challenge of a sustained conversation is impressive in its own
way. But it's mostly disappointing. Imagine seeing repeated claims of public
key encryption weaknesses that all turn out to be variants of social
engineering approaches to stealing passphrases. Those wouldn't exactly be
_incorrect_ claims but wouldn't be very _interesting kinds_ of correct claims
either.

