A room that answers perfectly in Chinese, using only a rulebook, understands nothing

John Searle imagined a person who speaks no Chinese locked in a room with a rulebook for matching Chinese symbols to other Chinese symbols. Fed questions, they could produce perfect answers by mechanically following the rules, convincing anyone outside that they understood Chinese. Searle argued this shows a computer can pass every behavioral test for understanding without actually understanding anything at all.

— John Searle, Minds, Brains, and Programs — Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 1980