He knows them by labels X and Y, and at the end of the game he says either ‘X is A and Y is B’ or ‘X is B and Y is A’. The object of the game for the interrogator is to determine which of the other two is the man and which is the woman. The interrogator stays in a room apart from the other two. It is played with three people, a man (A), a woman (B), and an interrogator (C) who may be of either sex. The new form of the problem can be described in terms of a game which we call the ‘imitation game’. Instead of attempting such a definition I shall replace the question by another, which is closely related to it and is expressed in relatively unambiguous words. If the meaning of the words ‘machine’ and ‘think’ are to be found by examining how they are commonly used it is difficult to escape the conclusion that the meaning and the answer to the question, ‘Can machines think?’ is to be sought in a statistical survey such as a Gallup poll. The definitions might be framed so as to reflect so far as possible the normal use of the words, but this attitude is dangerous. I propose to consider the question, ‘Can machines think?’ This should begin with definitions of the meaning of the terms ‘machine’ and ‘think’.
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