Geoffrey Jefferson · 1949
The Mind of Mechanical Man (Lister Oration)
- Language
- English
- Form
- Essay
- Text
- In copyright
- English
- English original
- Selected
- Ben Breen, 2026-09-29; suggested by Claude research agents, 29 Sep 2026
- Status
- Arguments unverified; quotations chosen by machine, unchecked
Q02THINKING
Would a machine's ability to converse appropriately be sufficient evidence that it thinks?No. fitting output is not evidence of thought without feeling and self-awareness. A machine that produces sonnets or answers is not thinking unless it writes them from felt thoughts and emotions and knows that it has done so.
British Medical Journal, 25 June 1949 · Web search: Lister Oration at the Royal College of Surgeons, published BMJ 25 June 1949; copy held in the Turing Digital Archive (AMT/B/44). Turing quotes it in 1950 as the argument from consciousness.