Ray Bradbury's The Long Years, Pass The Imitation Game

Can the family in Ray Bradbury’s short story “The Long Years”, pass the Turing test in the “Imitation Game”? Of course, we know that they are not really humans, but what if they were? What if we didn’t know? Let’s explore this. The Imitation Game is a theory developed to answer the question, “can machines think”? The author, A.M. Turing, theorizes that one could apply the elements of the “imitation game” used to determine a man from a woman with the use of only typed text to a computer and thus determine thinking. Turing believed that there would come a time in the future when computers could play the “imitation game so well that the average interrogator have not more than 70 percent chance of making the right identification after five minutes of questioning” (Turing 470).

The Hathaway wife and children would pass the Turing test because it took the evidence of the gravestones to convince Captain Wilder and Williamson that the family wasn’t human.

Even though, they had their suspicions based on the math of their ages, they needed outside proof to let go of the idea (Bradbury 459). The test itself only gives five minutes and the use of the typed answers of each participant. The Hathaway wife and children do not, however, possess Viva Voce, from the Latin meaning “with living voice”. This is not to say that they did not pass the Turing Test, but Turing himself stated that not until a machine can write or compose because of the thoughts and emotions felt and not by chance fall of symbols could we agree that a machine equals brain (Turing 472). The family did not express grief at Dr. Hathaway’s passing even though they would have passed the Turing test fairly well. Turing says in his example regrading Professor Jefferson that if the answers were as satisfactory and sustained as this, most would accept this test (Turing

473).
The power of the convincing quality of the dialogue, demeanor and look of the family caused the Captain to have empathy and return to shake the Hathaway wife’s hand before leaving (Bradbury 462). The “test” was accepted and empathy was stirred even though they knew for certain at this point that the family were not living creatures. Acceptance of them may not prove intelligence, but they were certainly able to evoke a “Viva Voce” in the Captain. It is possible that this is more important than the organic intelligence after all.

Bradbury, Ray. “The Long Years”.
Arguing about Literature, edited by John Schilb & John Clifford
2nd ed., Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2017, pp. 470-474.

Turing, A.M. "From 'Computing Machinery and Intelligence'".
Arguing about Literature, edited by John Schilb & John Clifford
2nd ed., Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2017, pp. 470-474.