Chinese Room argument commits fallacy of composition

Just because one part of the Chinese Room (the man shuffling the symbols) doesn't understand Chinese, it doesn't logically follow that the Chinese Room as a whole doesn't understand Chinese.

David Cole 1984.

The fallacy of composition: the parts of a system need not have the properties  of the whole. For example, individual water molecules aren't wet, but it doesn't follow that water itself is not wet.
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