I agree that great advances can be made from statistically parsing language but it is another thing entirely to have a computer (for example) read all of Shakes

I agree that great advances can be made from statistically parsing language but it is another thing entirely to have a computer (for example) read all of Shakespeare's sonnets and write an essay about the influence they have had on other authors. Even if it is as a highschool level. I kind of see statistical parsing as another "parlor trick" type of AI. Impressive and hard to achieve but somehow separate from true intelligence. It's hard to formally describe this distinction which is why I think that advances will come from cross cutting academic departments and reaching out from the "throw more math and more processors at the problem approach" To achieve a true AI we will have to advance not just our understanding of algorithms, but our understanding of what it means to be intelligent which is a concept that I think most people lack any coherent definition of.