[glenstein]

If a bright-line distinction between syntax and semantics requires a rejection of materialism, to me that is a pretty compelling reason to not draw a distinction between syntax and semantics.

Maybe "most people" ignore the evidence, but I think anigbrowl gave a pretty good response and I'd reiterate his suggestion that Hofstadter and Dennett have given adequate replies to Searle. I would go so far as to say Hofstadter's Godel Escher Bach is the most important popular-audience book ever written about AI.

[ehsanu1]

There is clearly a distinction between the two, and we don't know how to use symbols to represent meaning [1]. But the fact that we don't know how to do so yet obviously does not mean that that is no way, or that our brains are not doing it right now.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symbol_grounding