/e-li:'z* *-fekt'/ (From eliza) The tendency of humans to attach associations to terms from prior experience. For example, there is nothing magic about the symbol "+" that makes it well-suited to indicate addition; it's just that people associate it with addition. Using "+" or "plus" to mean addition in a computer language is taking advantage of the ELIZA effect.

The ELIZA effect is a good thing when writing a programming language, but it can blind you to serious shortcomings when analysing an artificial intelligence system.

Compare ad-hockery; see also ai-complete.

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