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For those not familiar with Colby and Parry (see interesting conversation at end):

NYT May 12, 2001
Kenneth Colby, 81, Expert in Artificial Intelligence, Is Dead
By WOLFGANG SAXON

Dr. Kenneth Mark Colby, a psychiatrist known for his work with
artificial intelligence, died on April 20 at his home in Malibu,
Calif. He was 81.

Dr. Colby, a founder and chairman of Malibu Artifactual Intelligence
Works, a software company, was an emeritus professor of psychiatry and
behavioral sciences at the University of California at Los Angeles.

He created one of the early software programs known as chatterbots,
which simulate conversations with people. His program, called Parry,
for paranoia, appeared in 1971 and is said to be the only one to have
passed the "Turing test," named for the British mathematician Alan M.
Turing, who in 1950 suggested that if a computer could successfully
impersonate a human by carrying on a typed conversation with a person,
it could be called intelligent.

With Parry, Dr. Colby established that a computer chip could be
programmed to imitate a paranoid schizophrenic. In test interviews,
psychiatrists communicating with Parry by Teletype were indeed unable
to distinguish its responses from those of real paranoiacs.

Kenneth Colby was born in Waterbury, Conn., and graduated from Yale in
1941 and from its School of Medicine two years later.

Early in his career, he was a professor of computer science at
Stanford, where he also did research for the National Institute of
Mental Health. He created Parry at the university's Artificial
Intelligence Laboratory.

In 1974, he went to U.C.L.A., where he was affiliated with the
department of psychiatry and biobehavioral sciences.

At 31, Dr. Colby published "A Primer for Psychotherapists." He wrote
or contributed to nine more books and over 100 articles on psychiatry,
psychology, psychotherapy and artificial intelligence.

He and his son, Peter, founded Malibu Artifactual Intelligence Works
in 1989. Among the software they produced is a therapy program called
Overcoming Depression, which features interactive plain language
designed to help a patient understand, overcome and prevent
depression.

Besides his son, of Malibu, Dr. Colby is survived by his wife of 43
years, Maxine Hansbold Colby; a daughter, Erin Johnson of Santa Maria,
Calif.; and two grandsons.

Dr. Colby adapted Parry from another program, Eliza, created in 1966
by Dr. Joseph Weizenbaum at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Eliza was developed more as a language-parsing tool than as an
exercise in human intelligence. Named for the Eliza Doolittle
character in "Pygmalion," it was the first conversational computer
program, designed to imitate a psychotherapist asking questions
instead of giving advice. It appeared to give conversational answers,
although it could be led to lapse into obtuse nonsense.

Eliza and the paranoid Parry eventually met for a "talk," executing
different programs. One exchange went something like this:

PARRY In my opinion, you have a one- track mind.

ELIZA What makes you think I have a one-track mind?

PARRY I used to go to the track every week.

ELIZA What does that suggest to you?

PARRY I avoid racetracks now because the races are fixed.

ELIZA Is that the real reason?

PARRY I'd rather not discuss it.

ELIZA What else would you like to discuss?

PARRY That's something I don't want to go into.

Were it not for the existence of sin in the world, says Calvin, human beings would believe in God to the same degree and with the same natural spontaneity displayed in our belief in the existence of other persons, or an external world, or the past.

This is the... natural human condition---it is because of our presently unnatural sinful condition that many of us find belief in God difficult or absurd.

The fact is, Calvin thinks, one who does not believe in God is in an epistemically defective position-rather like someone who does not believe that his wife exists, or thinks that she is a cleverly constructed robot that has no thoughts, feelings, or consciousness. Thus the believer reverses Freud and Marx, claiming that what they see as sickness(Truth) is really health and what they see as health(Atheism/evolution) is really sickness.