Based on the class discussion Claude Shannon seems like he was quite the character. In a way it seems as though Shannon was working in the spirit of Montgomery Meigs. Meigs began the process of rationalizing people into data and Shannon did something similar with language. I guess language is too narrow though, Shannon created a way to transmit any message by changing it into pure information.

Shannon’s work appears to be very straightforward, or at least we did not discuss any conflicting theories. A message is just information, the meaning does not matter. I understand the theory of it but I am fuzzy on its real world application. I do wish we had gone more in depth about the practical aspects of his Theory of Communication.

Shannon also worked with Turing, although it is not clear that they interacted. They both work in the field of Cryptography. Turing developed the machine intelligence test. I can understand that if a machines behavior can fool you, you should consider it intelligent. I agree with it but only because I think it’s smart to err on the side of caution, especially during a time of war. I think that Searle’s critique makes a good point because I don’t consider intelligence to be the ability to follow instructions. I don’t think I’m intelligent because I can assemble Ikea furniture (although they do make it difficult). I think free thought has a hand in intelligence. However they were at war and like I said before, better safe than sorry.