For those who don't know, Alan Turing proposed a though experiment in his essay on "thinking machines", as a way to empirically sidestep the question of what it would mean for a machine to think. The proposed test was an imitation game to see if a panel of judges could determine, in a blind study (no prior information on the subjects), which conversation partner (interacting through chat program), if any, was a computer, and which, if any, was a human. As an interesting historical note, Turing struggled with gender identity issues, and he first proposed the test in terms of men and women imitating one another (in the same paper, as a precursor to the computerized version). A followup thought experiment was proposed by the philosopher John Searle to reject the idea that computers could be given consciousness. This one is both more involved, and more interesting:
suppose that artificial intelligence research has succeeded in constructing a computer that behaves as if it understands Chinese. It takes Chinese characters as input and, by following the instructions of a computer program, produces other Chinese characters, which it presents as output. Suppose, says Searle, that this computer performs its task so convincingly that it comfortably passes the Turing test: it convinces a human Chinese speaker that the program is itself a live Chinese speaker. To all of the questions that the person asks, it makes appropriate responses, such that any Chinese speaker would be convinced that he or she is talking to another Chinese-speaking human being.
The question Searle wants to answer is this: does the machine literally "understand" Chinese? Or is it merely simulating the ability to understand Chinese? Searle calls the first position "strong AI" and the latter "weak AI".
Searle then supposes that he is in a closed room and has a book with an English version of the computer program, along with sufficient paper, pencils, erasers, and filing cabinets. Searle could receive Chinese characters through a slot in the door, process them according to the program's instructions, and produce Chinese characters as output. As the computer had passed the Turing test this way, it is fair, says Searle, to deduce that he would be able to do so as well, simply by running the program manually.
Searle asserts that there is no essential difference between the role the computer plays in the first case and the role he plays in the latter. Each is simply following a program, step-by-step, which simulates intelligent behavior. And yet, Searle points out, "I don't speak a word of Chinese." Since he does not understand Chinese, Searle argues, we must infer that the computer does not understand Chinese either.
Re. "Good and Evil," first: thank you for using colloquial language!
This is less an intentional decision on my part and more a byproduct of the subject matter being less closely related to the technical fields of logic, theory of computation and physics than our previous conversation; but I'm glad I was understood.
Second: Why does our understanding of "good" have to be strictly in terms of our relationship with God? Or, by "other image-bearers," do you mean "all mankind"?
You have it exactly - it is Christian theology that mankind is created in the image of God. Of course you are free to discuss other answers to the "problem of evil" that don't build on Christian theology, but I was providing my own answer. You could also frame the idea of "good" however you want to construct your own argument on the issue (though, as you point out, we might disagree on which formulation is the correct one), but I find framing the definition of good in terms of relationship is a helpful way to do away with silly idealized representational objects and deal with something concrete. Ultimately, I would say relationships between ourselves and God, ourselves and other human beings, and ourselves and the universe are all important in understanding "good", but in a Christian theology where human beings are God's "image-bearers" and the entire universe is His Creation, than it should be easy to see that if your relationship with either of the latter two is somehow gone wrong, than our relationship to God is also gone wrong (if I burn down your house, and punch your child in the face, I have a problem with my relationship to you just as much as I do in my relationship to your child or your house).
Third: You use the term "Perfect and Loving." Given "God exists" as your premise, with the (assumed) corollary that God is also "perfect," I would add that men (and women) are NOT perfect. Basically, because we're not, and that's OK--since we're only in God's "Likeness" God may treat us in a "perfect and loving" manner (which I would, of course, disagree with; and can, and later will, find plenty of examples), but we--by our nature--cannot deal with him in a perfect manner.
You're almost spot on here as well - note that the original question is framed in terms of "how can God exist if _____", so answers are going to be "He could exist like ________", or "He couldn't". I should also describe God as "perfectly just" in addition to the other attributes I've already mentioned, since it is an important one, one I suspect will come up later (in anticipation to your objection of my view of God). The one correction I have to make is that in Christian theology there is a degree of imperfection in human nature which extends beyond the simple fact of our being finite beings and mere "likenesses" (do you prefer that phrase to "image-bearer"?) - which is the notion of The Fall. But you are correct in saying that within the premise of my argument, we - by nature - cannot deal with him, or anything else, in a perfect manner.
BTW, I have read that some people (typically young, Japanese men) claim to "love" their silicone/anime dolls. I would classify that as sad, and odd, or sick, but...evil?
I think you misunderstood my point here, but you raise another good one. My point was that I was not using "love" in the manner that implies "affection for a possession/food/activity", but rather the manner that implies inter-personal relationship. However your hesitancy to use the word "evil" in that case is actually somewhat prescient of Christian theology, in that we usually prefer to use the word "sin", which is a transliteration of a Greek word with the archery connotation of "missing the mark". It's hard to say what a right relationship with a silicone doll
would look like (not owning one in the first place, perhaps?), but it's easy to see it's not
that - they're "missing the mark" of the sort of relationships God intended for them to have.
But it seems that you are saying that God must allow us to screw up our relationships with other people (and him), or we lose autonomy/free-will.
Yes. That's the one-sentence summary. I might extend it by saying "and if we lose autonomy/free-will, than morality and good/evil become meaningless anyway".