Why (a kind of) AI can’t be done

Abstract

I provide what I believe is a definitive argument against strong classical representational AI—that branch of AI which believes that we can generate intelligence by giving computers representations that express the content of cognitive states. The argument comes in two parts. (1) There is a clear distinction between cognitive states (such as believing that the Earth is round) and the content of cognitive states (such as the belief that the Earth is round), yet strong representational AI tries to generate cognitive states by giving computers representations that express the content of cognitive states—representations, moreover, which we understand but which the computer does not. (2) The content of a cognitive state is the meaning of the sentence or other symbolism that expresses it. But if meanings were inner entities we would be unable to understand them. Consequently contents cannot be inner entities, so that we cannot generate cognitive states by giving computers inner representations that express the content of cognition. Moreover, since such systems are not even meant to understand the meanings of their representations, they cannot understand the content of their cognitive states. But not to understand the content of a cognitive state is not to have that cognitive state, so that, again, strong representational AI systems cannot have cognitive states and so cannot be intelligent.