Authors
- Zharov Alexander M. Russian Federation Moscow
Annotation
The relevance of the problem is determined by the growing role of artificial intelligence systems in the production and transmission of knowledge: as large language
models become integrated into the cognitive practices of millions of people, the question of the epistemic status of their “responses” acquires fundamental importance. The article aims to critically analyze the Turing test from the standpoint of virtue epistemology — a branch of analytic philosophy that links genuine knowledge to the intellectual character of the knowing subject. The methodological framework is provided by virtue epistemology as developed by L. Zagzebski and E. Sosa, which treats knowledge as an achievement conditioned by the subject’s possession of intellectual virtues: honesty, responsibility, openness to evidence, and love of truth. The main findings are: 1) the Turing test measures linguistic competence rather than epistemic responsibility; 2) AI systematically exhibits intellectual vices — confabulation, sycophancy, hyper-competence; 3) the test ignores the requirement of coherence of the belief system; 4) it substitutes an epistemic criterion with a social recognition ritual; 5) the imitation of intellectual virtues differs fundamentally from genuine virtues in motive, transparency, and normative structure of accountability. The conclusion
is that the Turing test constitutes a paradigmatic epistemological trap: it mistakes a behavioral copy of a virtuous agent for genuine knowledge.
How to link insert
Zharov, A. M. (2026). TURING TEST AS AN EPISTEMOLOGICAL TRAP: WHY IMITATION OF KNOWLEDGE IS NOT EQUAL TO KNOWLEDGE Bulletin of the Moscow City Pedagogical University. Series "Pedagogy and Psychology", № 2 (58), 55. https://doi.org/10.24412/2078-9238-2026-258-55-70
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