Abstract
Recently, mindreading ability is the topic of intensive investigations, fired by the “Theory of Mind” research by Premack & Woodruff. Few researchers, however, tried to define “mindreading” algorithmically. We mindread other people everyday, and think we know what mindreading really is—e.g. to reproduce in ourselves the “thought” existing in other's mind. Unfortunately, this definition cannot be applied for machine systems. Even for human beings or animals we cannot examine the thought in other's mind directly, and there is no method to verify the coincidence. We propose a definition of “mindreading” independent of the inner representation (thought) of mindreaders and mindreads. Next, Multi-player Prisoner's Dilemma Game (MPD) is proposed as a task where mindreading is expected to be effective for the survival of the players. Computer simulation shows “(by our definition) mindreading programs” are actually acquired through evolution in the MPD society. Lastly the validity of our definition of mindreading, the implication of our definition, and condition for the emergence of mindreading are discussed.
