Understanding Understanding: The Gatekeeping of Machine Intelligence

Philosophics — Philosophical and Political Ramblings · Aug 1, 2026 · 25m

This academic text by language philosopher Bry Willis outlines a thesis and structure for a paper examining how the term understanding is used to categorically exclude large language models from human-like competence. The author argues that understanding acts as a 'contestably' defined gatekeeper, allowing critics to shift goalposts whenever an AI passes a specific operational test. By analysing various scholarly sources, the text suggests a necessity gap exists where human communicative intent is treated as self-authenticating, while machine success is unfairly demoted to mere simulation…