4 ms·

> true AI What does this even mean?

by duaneb 11y ago

marvin 11y ago
You can define general artificial intelligence in many ways. This is probably not comprehensive, but "an artificially constructed agent that is capable of solving a wide variety of tasks in a wide variety of different environments, doing this to successfully achieve some stated goal" should cover it. Add a clause for mostly being at least as capable of doing this as an average human, if you want to be sure. At the moment this is closer to a philosophical idea than an actual scientific possibility, but science usually makes its biggest advances at the edge of philosophy. This is also where we can get an idea of the high-level problems that need to be solved. Think the idea of manned space exploration before the advent of rocketry, for instance.
- duaneb 11y ago
  I dunno, there are plenty of humans that wouldn't make it to AI classification by that measurement, so I'm a skeptical to say the least. I don't think any of us are going to see past the uncanny valley of human-computer interaction—computers will have their tasks, but they'll be just that—task solvers. Why make it more magical than that? It's a waste of money to try, too—much of what makes humans unique isn't really useful in a business context (like giving up on problems because you're bored or hungry or having desires).
  - pixl97 11y ago
    >like giving up on problems because you're bored That is actually one of the more useful things a computer can do. It is also one of the hardest to program (see the halting problem). It is very useful for a computer for a computer to be able to do that when it has to pick out millions of likely candidates from quadrillions of possible answers. >but they'll be just that—task solvers. Why make it more magical than that? So you're in the 'people are magic' camp. You'll be very disappointed when you learn that people are just billions of years of bio-chemistry left to run rampant and that electro-mechanics and reproduce the same thing.
    - duaneb 11y ago
      > So you're in the 'people are magic' camp. ...how are you extrapolating that from anything I said? All I mean is that "AI" is inherently meaningless. When you ground it in reality there are more useful terms that are meaningful. Also, I meant to point out that large parts of the brain's chemistry are not useful to emulate, leading me to question using humans as a base for "intelligence" comparison
- jlarocco 11y ago
  I think a big part of "true AI" is the ability to learn knew things. AlphaGo, for example, can only play Go. It's never going to learn to play Poker, Scrabble, or Doom, without being completely reprogrammed.
  - duaneb 11y ago
    But even humans can't always learn new things—at least not well. It seems to come down to being able to interpret language in a way that is broadly within the range of a human's ability to agree with another human on the meaning of a phrase.

> true AI What does this even mean?

by duaneb 11y ago

> true AI What does this even mean?

You can define general artificial intelligence in many ways. This is probably not comprehensive, but "an artificially constructed agent that is capable of solving a wide variety of tasks in a wide variety of different environments, doing this to successfully achieve some stated goal" should cover it. Add a clause for mostly being at least as capable of doing this as an average human, if you want to be sure. At the moment this is closer to a philosophical idea than an actual scientific possibility, but science usually makes its biggest advances at the edge of philosophy. This is also where we can get an idea of the high-level problems that need to be solved. Think the idea of manned space exploration before the advent of rocketry, for instance.

duaneb 11y ago
I dunno, there are plenty of humans that wouldn't make it to AI classification by that measurement, so I'm a skeptical to say the least. I don't think any of us are going to see past the uncanny valley of human-computer interaction—computers will have their tasks, but they'll be just that—task solvers. Why make it more magical than that? It's a waste of money to try, too—much of what makes humans unique isn't really useful in a business context (like giving up on problems because you're bored or hungry or having desires).
- pixl97 11y ago
  >like giving up on problems because you're bored That is actually one of the more useful things a computer can do. It is also one of the hardest to program (see the halting problem). It is very useful for a computer for a computer to be able to do that when it has to pick out millions of likely candidates from quadrillions of possible answers. >but they'll be just that—task solvers. Why make it more magical than that? So you're in the 'people are magic' camp. You'll be very disappointed when you learn that people are just billions of years of bio-chemistry left to run rampant and that electro-mechanics and reproduce the same thing.
  - duaneb 11y ago
    > So you're in the 'people are magic' camp. ...how are you extrapolating that from anything I said? All I mean is that "AI" is inherently meaningless. When you ground it in reality there are more useful terms that are meaningful. Also, I meant to point out that large parts of the brain's chemistry are not useful to emulate, leading me to question using humans as a base for "intelligence" comparison
jlarocco 11y ago
I think a big part of "true AI" is the ability to learn knew things. AlphaGo, for example, can only play Go. It's never going to learn to play Poker, Scrabble, or Doom, without being completely reprogrammed.
- duaneb 11y ago
  But even humans can't always learn new things—at least not well. It seems to come down to being able to interpret language in a way that is broadly within the range of a human's ability to agree with another human on the meaning of a phrase.