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Fluency Without Understanding

This video presents the same text shown beside it, spoken and on screen. It adds nothing the text does not say.

State

A system can produce fluent, appropriate-sounding language without any grasp of what its words mean.

Show

ELIZA, a 1960s program, held typed conversations by keyword-matching and transformation rules — and its inventor reported users attributing insight and reasoning to it.

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The attributions were the speakers' contribution, not the machine's achievement.