Turing's Wager is a

philosophical argument An argument is a statement or group of statements called premises intended to determine the degree of truth or acceptability of another statement called conclusion. Arguments can be studied from three main perspectives: the logical, the dialectic ...

that claims it is impossible to infer or deduce a detailed mathematical model of the

human brain The human brain is the central organ of the human nervous system, and with the spinal cord makes up the central nervous system. The brain consists of the cerebrum, the brainstem and the cerebellum. It controls most of the activities of the ...

within a reasonable timescale, and thus impossible in any practical sense. The argument was first given in 1950 by the

computational theorist In theoretical computer science and mathematics, the theory of computation is the branch that deals with what problems can be solved on a model of computation, using an algorithm, how efficiently they can be solved or to what degree (e.g., ...

Alan Turing Alan Mathison Turing (; 23 June 1912 – 7 June 1954) was an English mathematician, computer scientist, logician, cryptanalyst, philosopher, and theoretical biologist. Turing was highly influential in the development of theoretical com ...

in his paper ''

Computing Machinery and Intelligence "Computing Machinery and Intelligence" is a seminal paper written by Alan Turing on the topic of artificial intelligence. The paper, published in 1950 in ''Mind'', was the first to introduce his concept of what is now known as the Turing test to ...

'', published in ''

Mind The mind is the set of faculties responsible for all mental phenomena. Often the term is also identified with the phenomena themselves. These faculties include thought, imagination, memory, will, and sensation. They are responsible for various m ...

'' . The argument asserts that determining any

mathematical model A mathematical model is a description of a system using mathematical concepts and language. The process of developing a mathematical model is termed mathematical modeling. Mathematical models are used in the natural sciences (such as physics, ...

of a computer (its

source code In computing, source code, or simply code, is any collection of code, with or without comments, written using a human-readable programming language, usually as plain text. The source code of a program is specially designed to facilitate the wo ...

or any isomorphic equivalent such as a

Turing machine A Turing machine is a mathematical model of computation describing an abstract machine that manipulates symbols on a strip of tape according to a table of rules. Despite the model's simplicity, it is capable of implementing any computer algori ...

or virtual simulation) is not possible in a reasonable timeframe. As a consequence, determining a mathematical model of the human brain (which is, by its nature, more complicated) must also be impossible within that timeframe.

Effect of modern technology on wager

It has been argued that modern neuroimaging techniques will allow researchers to create accurate simulations of the human mind within the 21st century (; , ), thereby overcoming the wager.Turing's Wager should not be confused with 'A Wager on the Turing Test', a real-life wager between Kurzweil and Mitchell Kapor over whether a computer will pass the Turing Test by 2029 . Others have argued that such claims are unjustified .

Relationship between Turing's Wager and the Turing Test

The

Turing Test The Turing test, originally called the imitation game by Alan Turing in 1950, is a test of a machine's ability to artificial intelligence, exhibit intelligent behaviour equivalent to, or indistinguishable from, that of a human. Turing propos ...

attempts to define when a machine might be said to possess

human intelligence Human intelligence is the intellectual capability of humans, which is marked by complex cognitive feats and high levels of motivation and self-awareness. High intelligence is associated with better outcomes in life. Through intelligence, humans ...

, while Turing's Wager is an argument aiming to demonstrate that characterising the brain mathematically will take over a thousand years. While building an

artificial intelligence Artificial intelligence (AI) is intelligence—perceiving, synthesizing, and inferring information—demonstrated by machines, as opposed to intelligence displayed by animals and humans. Example tasks in which this is done include speech re ...

and mapping the human brain are both difficult endeavours, the former is actually a sub-problem of the latter .

Footnotes

References

* * * * * * {{Refend Alan Turing History of artificial intelligence History of neuroscience Neurophilosophy Arguments in philosophy of mind