Author Topic: Robots and their impact on the future  (Read 537635 times)

EscapeVelocity2020

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #250 on: February 16, 2015, 06:01:57 PM »
yeah mathew'ed, I think we're talking past each other at this point.  I was just making the distinction about how hard it is to get a program to create 'real intelligence' (like how the economy 'figures out the best price for things', that is an artificial construct also, but comes out of our numerous interactions to create 'spontaneous order', etc.).  Machine learning is only fascinating right now in the fact that it makes something that is innate in us to look like 'intelligence' in something without our hardware, but it takes a lot of pre-programming and computing power.  FWIW, I took a grad-level LISP AI course in college and tried to get a machine to solve a simple problem of getting a simulated monkey to use a ladder to get a banana.  I had to give it all of the possible starting points and ways to make solutions; it was a pathetic 'magic trick' to be honest.  The field is further ahead, but is moving at a snail's pace, compared to how much more powerful computers are today.

arebelspy

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #251 on: February 16, 2015, 06:49:50 PM »
Depending on how you define intelligence yes ARS is right.

Exactly.  As Part 1 of the WBW article, ANI is everywhere.

A computer is much more intelligent than I at finding the best route to a place, even if I were given maps.

A computer is much more intelligent than I at chess, or recommending what someone should buy based on their past purchases.

There's a lot of intelligence computers already have.

If you want to tag something to the moving goalposts of "artificial intelligence," well, I have no interest in that.  You use terms like "real intelligence" - whatever that means.

Did you read the WBW article with the three levels of intelligence?  We very clearly have tons of ANI all around us.

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EscapeVelocity2020

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #252 on: February 16, 2015, 08:08:00 PM »
ANI has not convinced anyone that AI will become a reality.  I think that is what you are getting hung up on.  I guess it's just semantics.  If anything, I'd argue that people are moving the goalposts when they call ANI 'intelligence'.  Just becuase Watson can search lots of information faster than humans or Deep Blue can call upon more computational power and openings than a human chess player does not mean there is real 'intelligence' there, in the same way that people aren't saying 'holy crap, Siri is a real thinker.  She gives me all sorts of interesting ideas'.  No, this stuff is all just really good search engines and human manipulated algorithms that still make completely ridiculous, 'unintelligent' errors.

The fact that I confuse you when I use a term 'real intelligence' does make me wonder why you struggle to comprehend 'artificial and real' intelligence, and defend ANI as 'real'.  ARS must be an AI, and I'm quite proud to have failed him on a modified Touring test!

Sometimes I feel like I'm talking to Ramona 4.2 (http://www.kurzweilai.net/Ramona4.2/ramona.html)
« Last Edit: February 16, 2015, 08:37:32 PM by EscapeVelocity2020 »

sol

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #253 on: February 16, 2015, 08:37:57 PM »
No, this stuff is all just really good search engines and human manipulated algorithms that still make completely ridiculous, 'unintelligent' errors.

What do you think your brain is?  It's a really good search engine running heuristic algorithms on a neural network.  Coupled to a robot, of course, but I don't think anyone thinks that part is really necessary.

I don't think it makes any difference whether the neural network in question is wet chemistry or dry chemistry.  It's all electrons and switches, either way.

I'm fairly confident that we'll one day discover that consciousness is an illusion.  Your brain thinks it is self aware because it has been programmed to think that it is self aware, because there is an adaptive advantage to that belief.  I suspect that any sufficiently challenged cooperative social species with the right hardware would develop "consciousness" if given enough time, we just happen to be the only remaining species on earth to still have it.

But all of that is just an aside.  Most of the current writing about AI isn't worried it will become self aware, just that whatever limited and specific intelligence it does have (like spam filters or chess) will be sufficiently capable of self improvement that we won't be able to slow it down.  It doesn't matter if Skynet is really self aware or not, if it kills people they're still dead.

EscapeVelocity2020

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #254 on: February 16, 2015, 08:49:42 PM »
No, this stuff is all just really good search engines and human manipulated algorithms that still make completely ridiculous, 'unintelligent' errors.

What do you think your brain is?  It's a really good search engine running heuristic algorithms on a neural network.  Coupled to a robot, of course, but I don't think anyone thinks that part is really necessary.

I don't think it makes any difference whether the neural network in question is wet chemistry or dry chemistry.  It's all electrons and switches, either way.

I'm fairly confident that we'll one day discover that consciousness is an illusion.  Your brain thinks it is self aware because it has been programmed to think that it is self aware, because there is an adaptive advantage to that belief.  I suspect that any sufficiently challenged cooperative social species with the right hardware would develop "consciousness" if given enough time, we just happen to be the only remaining species on earth to still have it.

But all of that is just an aside.  Most of the current writing about AI isn't worried it will become self aware, just that whatever limited and specific intelligence it does have (like spam filters or chess) will be sufficiently capable of self improvement that we won't be able to slow it down.  It doesn't matter if Skynet is really self aware or not, if it kills people they're still dead.

I highly value open discussion.  But hey, I don't think my brain is a great search engine or algorithm connected to a robot.  It is actually a pretty impressive piece of hardware, given the paces I have put it through in my childhood, endocrine-riddled teenage years, and successive 20's and 30's....  it's quite amazing that I can still think a coherent thought, let alone postulate on what intelligence might actually be.

What is it about me that makes me want to raise my son and daughter 'properly'?  These are the little distinctions that are lost on AI.  For machine language, it has one specific goal and 'ruthlessly' pursues that until everything is destroyed.  That is no 'utopia', so why are we seeking it?

(but I will answer my own question, real quick.  We seek ASI because, if we do happen to live through AGI, then ASI will be awesome!)
« Last Edit: February 16, 2015, 08:52:17 PM by EscapeVelocity2020 »

sol

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #255 on: February 16, 2015, 09:06:39 PM »
I don't think my brain is a great search engine or algorithm connected to a robot.

What do you think it is?

By "robot", or course, I just mean a physical system capable of movement.  But people who are fully paralyzed in an iron lung can still have perfectly functional brains, and we think of them as self aware.  I was just trying to highlight that the "intelligence" part and the robot part aren't necessarily interdependent.

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #256 on: February 16, 2015, 09:24:14 PM »
yeah mathew'ed, I think we're talking past each other at this point.  I was just making the distinction about how hard it is to get a program to create 'real intelligence' (like how the economy 'figures out the best price for things', that is an artificial construct also, but comes out of our numerous interactions to create 'spontaneous order', etc.).  Machine learning is only fascinating right now in the fact that it makes something that is innate in us to look like 'intelligence' in something without our hardware, but it takes a lot of pre-programming and computing power.  FWIW, I took a grad-level LISP AI course in college and tried to get a machine to solve a simple problem of getting a simulated monkey to use a ladder to get a banana.  I had to give it all of the possible starting points and ways to make solutions; it was a pathetic 'magic trick' to be honest.  The field is further ahead, but is moving at a snail's pace, compared to how much more powerful computers are today.

We humans can do some impressive stuff, but even as adults, we are absolute idiots from all sorts of perspectives.  Also, our babies take all sorts of pre-programming (genetics) and computing power (brains, fueled successfully only by eating a whole bunch of stuff for many years), before they can perform the intelligent operations we adults can.  Toddlers have years of learning under their belts, and they can still be pretty dumb sometimes:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GLj0IZFLKvg

Also, EV2020, I will disagree that some of the things you mention we can do are really "intelligence" at all: 

"It is what distinguishes our thought process from any other in existence - that we walk on uneven terrain without struggling to understand how we do it, find others attractive without knowing why, and enjoy certain things but dislike others, without any predictable pattern." 

Finding others attractive without knowing why makes us sound stupid, and what we enjoy or don't is usually just related to what will increase our odds of passing our genes to the next generation.  If some of our likes and dislikes are in fact an "unpredictable pattern", we're probably  just too dumb to figure the pattern out.
« Last Edit: February 16, 2015, 09:30:38 PM by Grid »

arebelspy

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #257 on: February 16, 2015, 09:26:23 PM »
The fact that I confuse you when I use a term 'real intelligence' does make me wonder why you struggle to comprehend 'artificial and real' intelligence, and defend ANI as 'real'.

Or maybe you should understand that your definitions are not universal, and not everyone agrees with them.
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EscapeVelocity2020

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #258 on: February 16, 2015, 09:27:20 PM »
I know one or two things about my brain (trying to imagine myself as being reduced to just brain matter).  -  It enjoys physical interaction more that internet banter.  And my brain really does want to 'invent' a brain, but we also enjoy virtual reality much more that I would have imagined, given the limitless nature of imagination...  I actually think we will see advances in VR before we experience AI advances...
« Last Edit: February 17, 2015, 09:02:11 AM by EscapeVelocity2020 »

arebelspy

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #259 on: February 16, 2015, 09:39:31 PM »
Not sure how that's relevant; AI and VR aren't mutually exclusive.
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EscapeVelocity2020

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #260 on: February 16, 2015, 10:00:21 PM »
Not sure how that's relevant; AI and VR aren't mutually exclusive.
OK, so now I am really confused.  VR is pretty much going to dominate the foreseeable future (and wow people with how crazy life has become, etc.)  I see this distraction as being the 70" flat screen people aspired to in my young adulthood.  But AI, 'real artificial intelligence', that would be a generation-skipping advance.  I honestly don't see it happening anytime 'soon'.

arebelspy

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #261 on: February 16, 2015, 10:03:44 PM »
Not sure how that's relevant; AI and VR aren't mutually exclusive.
OK, so now I am really confused.  VR is pretty much going to dominate the foreseeable future (and wow people with how crazy life has become, etc.)  I see this distraction as being the 70" flat screen people aspired to in my young adulthood.  But AI, 'real artificial intelligence', that would be a generation-skipping advance.  I honestly don't see it happening anytime 'soon'.

Yes, we appear not to be talking about the same thing.

I fail to see how an entertainment distraction is relevant to the progression of AI.

Just as TV being developed didn't distract smart people enough to prevent them from making computers (and improving them), VR won't distract smart people enough to be relevant to the progress of AI.
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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #262 on: February 17, 2015, 06:45:52 AM »
VR's relevance is quite questionable. It is such a narrow thing compared to the concept of AI that it really doesn't matter. It isn't going to affect the further development of AI. VR is just a variation of entertainment, AI is the advancement and replacement of human intelligence with machine intelligence. Which seems more impactful and important to attempt to understand said impact? I'd lean towards AI. For everyone who is saying it won't be a thing or don't believe it will have a big impact (or doesn't already given that there are an incredibly large number of AI systems out there right now) have you read the WBW post? Do you know what Google, Facebook, and other tech companies are capable of right now let alone what they will be capable of in the coming decades? Dead horse and all... when, not if AI advances beyond our capabilities in more general categories.

EscapeVelocity2020

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #263 on: February 17, 2015, 08:57:57 AM »
Sometimes I talk to myself out loud too much.  Where I was going with VR is that it is just as capable as AI at making 'reality' as we currently know it irrelevant.  Just having an interesting discussion about topics that interest me, not trying to win any 'internet points'.

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #264 on: February 25, 2015, 06:43:52 PM »

EscapeVelocity2020

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #265 on: February 26, 2015, 11:28:29 AM »
Pretty sobering overview and some new thoughts on YouTube... 

http://youtu.be/7Pq-S557XQU

(OT - found the clip via CGP Grey being a featured Patreon.com member, having ~2,000 people voluntarily pay ~$5,500 per video and thus not feel too guilty about ad-blocking on his YouTube video).

EscapeVelocity2020

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #266 on: February 26, 2015, 08:32:05 PM »
Also thought this was kind'a interesting:  http://www.mercurynews.com/business/ci_27597173/google-artificial-intelligence-program-can-beat-you-at

Quote
Carnegie Mellon University computer science professor Emma Brunskill, who also wasn't part of the study, said this learning despite lack of customization "brings us closer to having general purpose agents equipped to work well at learning a large range of tasks, instead of just chess or just 'Jeopardy!'"

...

But to some ways of thinking, Deep Q wasn't even as smart as a toddler because it can't transfer learned experiences from one situation to another and it doesn't get abstract concepts, Hassabis said.

arebelspy

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #267 on: February 27, 2015, 08:32:44 AM »
Pretty sobering overview and some new thoughts on YouTube... 

http://youtu.be/7Pq-S557XQU

(OT - found the clip via CGP Grey being a featured Patreon.com member, having ~2,000 people voluntarily pay ~$5,500 per video and thus not feel too guilty about ad-blocking on his YouTube video).

That was a good introduction to someone completely unfamiliar with the topic of robot automation. I have a few people I'm going to send it to. Thanks for posting!
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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #268 on: February 27, 2015, 09:07:02 AM »
Also thought this was kind'a interesting:  http://www.mercurynews.com/business/ci_27597173/google-artificial-intelligence-program-can-beat-you-at

Quote
Carnegie Mellon University computer science professor Emma Brunskill, who also wasn't part of the study, said this learning despite lack of customization "brings us closer to having general purpose agents equipped to work well at learning a large range of tasks, instead of just chess or just 'Jeopardy!'"

...

But to some ways of thinking, Deep Q wasn't even as smart as a toddler because it can't transfer learned experiences from one situation to another and it doesn't get abstract concepts, Hassabis said.

Okay, that was pretty awesome. I knew they were doing a bunch of stuff ever since they bought Deep Mind (fun fact: they wouldn't sell to Google unless they created an AI Ethics Board), but hadn't really followed what they were doing after that. This is some awesome progress being made.

To those who didn't read the article, this is one of the most broad implementations of AI (read that: opposite of narrow AI). They didn't teach the system to play atari games, they taught the system how to learn how to play games!! Also, I love the fact that one of the games they want to teach it is Civilization. I'd be very curious as to what strategy it chooses.

EscapeVelocity2020

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #269 on: February 27, 2015, 10:04:42 AM »
... Also, I love the fact that one of the games they want to teach it is Civilization. I'd be very curious as to what strategy it chooses.

If you really want to geek out, here's the official publication in Nature:  http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v518/n7540/full/nature14236.html (Received 10 July 2014 Accepted 16 January 2015 Published online 25 February 2015).  So maybe it's already done with Civilization?

Quote
We set out to create a single algorithm that would be able to develop a wide range of competencies on a varied range of challenging tasks — a central goal of general artificial intelligence that has eluded previous efforts.  To achieve this, we developed a novel agent, a deep Q network (DQN), which is able to combine reinforcement learning with a class of artificial neural network known as deep neural networks.
Notably, recent advances in deep neural networks, in which several layers of nodes are used to build up progressively more abstract representations of the data, have made it possible for artificial neural networks to learn concepts such as object categories directly from raw sensory data. We use one particularly successful architecture, the deep convolutional network, which uses hierarchical layers of tiled convolutional filters to mimic the effects of receptive fields—inspired by Hubel and Wiesel’s seminal work on feed-forward processing in early visual cortex — thereby exploiting the local spatial correlations present in images, and building in robustness to natural transformations such as changes of viewpoint or scale...
 

Digging into the details, it's even more mind-blowingly close to AGI!  Like, holy shit!!

« Last Edit: February 27, 2015, 10:24:12 AM by EscapeVelocity2020 »

jordanread

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #270 on: February 27, 2015, 11:57:40 AM »
... Also, I love the fact that one of the games they want to teach it is Civilization. I'd be very curious as to what strategy it chooses.

If you really want to geek out, here's the official publication in Nature:  http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v518/n7540/full/nature14236.html (Received 10 July 2014 Accepted 16 January 2015 Published online 25 February 2015).  So maybe it's already done with Civilization?

Quote
We set out to create a single algorithm that would be able to develop a wide range of competencies on a varied range of challenging tasks — a central goal of general artificial intelligence that has eluded previous efforts.  To achieve this, we developed a novel agent, a deep Q network (DQN), which is able to combine reinforcement learning with a class of artificial neural network known as deep neural networks.
Notably, recent advances in deep neural networks, in which several layers of nodes are used to build up progressively more abstract representations of the data, have made it possible for artificial neural networks to learn concepts such as object categories directly from raw sensory data. We use one particularly successful architecture, the deep convolutional network, which uses hierarchical layers of tiled convolutional filters to mimic the effects of receptive fields—inspired by Hubel and Wiesel’s seminal work on feed-forward processing in early visual cortex — thereby exploiting the local spatial correlations present in images, and building in robustness to natural transformations such as changes of viewpoint or scale...
 

Digging into the details, it's even more mind-blowingly close to AGI!  Like, holy shit!!

Yeah. We live in an awesome time. I'll dig more into that article a bit later today.

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #271 on: March 02, 2015, 09:01:24 PM »
I came back here to post the Google DeepMind article, and forgot that I heard about it here first.  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

arebelspy

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #273 on: March 03, 2015, 11:16:16 AM »
Interesting backstory/biography on neural nets/deep learning and the researchers who've been working on it:
https://chronicle.com/article/The-Believers/190147/
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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #274 on: March 03, 2015, 11:33:00 AM »
I came back here to post the Google DeepMind article, and forgot that I heard about it here first.  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Ha ha. I did that on another thread about cycling a bit ago.

Religious AI?

http://www.itworld.com/article/2888014/digital-religion-and-artificial-wisdom.html

I suppose I shouldn't be surprised. I'd be interested to see how they would try to convert an artificially created life form. Would they have to convince themselves that they have a soul or something? And then would they have to convince the AI that it has a soul?

The author did touch on something that I thought would be interesting. I definitely think that anthropomorphizing AI is a mistake, but the idea of an empathetic AI is interesting.

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #275 on: March 03, 2015, 12:32:42 PM »
I'd be interested to see how they would try to convert an artificially created life form. Would they have to convince themselves that they have a soul or something? And then would they have to convince the AI that it has a soul?

Not just convince it that it has a soul, and that said soul needs saving, but also that the only path to salvation is the forgiveness of a benevolent third party.

And that this forgiveness can only be achieved through sacrificial bloodshed, so apparently the third party is benevolent but not too benevolent.  It's not really forgiveness if someone has to die, is it?

I'd like to believe that any superintelligence we create is smart enough to see through this kind of obvious logical fallacy.  It takes a certain kind of humanity to fall for this stuff.

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #276 on: March 03, 2015, 01:18:15 PM »
I'd be interested to see how they would try to convert an artificially created life form. Would they have to convince themselves that they have a soul or something? And then would they have to convince the AI that it has a soul?

Not just convince it that it has a soul, and that said soul needs saving, but also that the only path to salvation is the forgiveness of a benevolent third party.

And that this forgiveness can only be achieved through sacrificial bloodshed, so apparently the third party is benevolent but not too benevolent.  It's not really forgiveness if someone has to die, is it?

I'd like to believe that any superintelligence we create is smart enough to see through this kind of obvious logical fallacy.  It takes a certain kind of humanity to fall for this stuff.

Beliefs can be programmed into computers even easier than they are in humans.  An AI that can get past what it's programmed though, that's the bind blowing idea.  I barely understand what that means.
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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #277 on: March 04, 2015, 10:49:38 AM »
[quote
Also thought this was kind'a interesting:  http://www.mercurynews.com/business/ci_27597173/google-artificial-intelligence-program-can-beat-you-at
[/quote]

Interesting but the article does not specify how the AI observed the video game state, was there some human made custom interface for each game or did they point a web camera at a screen?  The latter being much more impressive.  May have to scan the publication.  From my own work interfacing can be a huge pain.


EscapeVelocity2020

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #278 on: March 04, 2015, 11:06:03 AM »
Interesting but the article does not specify how the AI observed the video game state, was there some human made custom interface for each game or did they point a web camera at a screen?  The latter being much more impressive.  May have to scan the publication.  From my own work interfacing can be a huge pain.

The details (and then some) are in the 'Nature' article I cited a post or two later... "If you really want to geek out, here's the official publication in Nature:  http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v518/n7540/full/nature14236.html "

Quick answer, the AI 'read the pixels' directly from the screen (so it sorta has an inherent advantage over humans there).
« Last Edit: March 04, 2015, 11:14:17 AM by EscapeVelocity2020 »

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #279 on: March 04, 2015, 11:55:44 AM »
Interesting but the article does not specify how the AI observed the video game state, was there some human made custom interface for each game or did they point a web camera at a screen?  The latter being much more impressive.  May have to scan the publication.  From my own work interfacing can be a huge pain.

The details (and then some) are in the 'Nature' article I cited a post or two later... "If you really want to geek out, here's the official publication in Nature:  http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v518/n7540/full/nature14236.html "

Quick answer, the AI 'read the pixels' directly from the screen (so it sorta has an inherent advantage over humans there).

cool, thanks.  Running at 60Hz (or what ever) is also a bit of an advantage, I cant press a button half that fast.

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #280 on: March 04, 2015, 12:03:27 PM »
cool, thanks.  Running at 60Hz (or what ever) is also a bit of an advantage, I cant press a button half that fast.

Just one more reason why super intelligent machines will one day rule the world.   The human operating system only runs on really slow and outdated hardware.

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #281 on: March 04, 2015, 12:14:08 PM »
cool, thanks.  Running at 60Hz (or what ever) is also a bit of an advantage, I cant press a button half that fast.

Just one more reason why super intelligent machines will one day rule the world.   The human operating system only runs on really slow and outdated hardware.

"Outdated hardware" lol.  New generations only come out once every 20-30 years, and it takes years to get a system up and running.  If you want significant hardware improvements you'll have to a wait a few thousand years.

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #282 on: March 04, 2015, 12:54:46 PM »
Just one more reason why super intelligent machines will one day rule the world.   The human operating system only runs on really slow and outdated hardware.
Well, humans are still way ahead of AI when it comes to power consumption and processing potential...
 
(From Rebs' link - https://chronicle.com/article/The-Believers/190147/)
Quote
Many of the dreams Rosenblatt shared in his news conference have come true. Others, like computer consciousness, remain distant. The largest neural nets today have about a billion connections, 1,000 times the size of a few years ago. But that’s tiny compared with the brain. A billion connections is a cubic millimeter of tissue; in a brain scan, it’d be less than a voxel. We’re far from human intelligence. Hinton remains intrigued and inspired by the brain, but he knows he’s not recreating it. It’s not even close.

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #283 on: March 04, 2015, 01:52:38 PM »
Well, humans are still way ahead of AI when it comes to power consumption and processing potential...

For now. 

Quote
Many of the dreams Rosenblatt shared in his news conference have come true. Others, like computer consciousness, remain distant. The largest neural nets today have about a billion connections, 1,000 times the size of a few years ago. But that’s tiny compared with the brain. A billion connections is a cubic millimeter of tissue; in a brain scan, it’d be less than a voxel. We’re far from human intelligence. Hinton remains intrigued and inspired by the brain, but he knows he’s not recreating it. It’s not even close.

Yet.
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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #285 on: March 18, 2015, 11:51:47 AM »
Well, humans are still way ahead of AI when it comes to power consumption and processing potential...

For now. 

Quote
Many of the dreams Rosenblatt shared in his news conference have come true. Others, like computer consciousness, remain distant. The largest neural nets today have about a billion connections, 1,000 times the size of a few years ago. But that’s tiny compared with the brain. A billion connections is a cubic millimeter of tissue; in a brain scan, it’d be less than a voxel. We’re far from human intelligence. Hinton remains intrigued and inspired by the brain, but he knows he’s not recreating it. It’s not even close.

Yet.


The increases have been exponential every since the time of Alan Turing, and there is no sign that is changing.
http://www.motherjones.com/media/2013/05/robots-artificial-intelligence-jobs-automation


Check out the animated infographic of filling Lake Michigan starting with one drop, and then doubling it every year to get a really good since of how dramatic a thing "exponential" actually is - and why, if the trend started in 1940 actually continues as it has for the past 75 years, we really should see real human level AI in our lifetimes.


It feels less dramatic in real time, because seeing each step makes it feel gradual, but Siri really is dramatically closer to passing Turing's test than Eliza was, and that was only 20 years.

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #286 on: March 18, 2015, 01:51:37 PM »
It feels less dramatic in real time, because seeing each step makes it feel gradual, but Siri really is dramatically closer to passing Turing's test than Eliza was, and that was only 20 years.

Eliza was written in the mid-1960s, so more like 45 years. :)

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #287 on: March 18, 2015, 01:54:25 PM »
Bakari!!! Haven't seen you around for a while. Glad you are chiming in! That gif was pretty awesome. It puts stuff in perspective.

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #288 on: March 18, 2015, 02:52:30 PM »
Well, humans are still way ahead of AI when it comes to power consumption and processing potential...

For now. 

Quote
Many of the dreams Rosenblatt shared in his news conference have come true. Others, like computer consciousness, remain distant. The largest neural nets today have about a billion connections, 1,000 times the size of a few years ago. But that’s tiny compared with the brain. A billion connections is a cubic millimeter of tissue; in a brain scan, it’d be less than a voxel. We’re far from human intelligence. Hinton remains intrigued and inspired by the brain, but he knows he’s not recreating it. It’s not even close.

Yet.

The increases have been exponential every since the time of Alan Turing, and there is no sign that is changing.

...

I was only summarizing (from the WhatButWhy link) and quoting, I realize that AGI/ASI will eventually happen in some way shape or form, I guess I confused folks by still being impressed by the human brain.  However, we should be discussing the real question - do we think ANI will go to AGI or ASI in our lifetime, and what is the reason to think so? 

On a side note, Chappie is all about AI.  I won't spoil, but basically it follows many mainstream thinkers in that immortality will be inevitable once consciousness can be created artificially.  Like time travel, I can think of practical reasons as to why I believe this will never come to pass.  Also, Kevin Kelly has an interesting 2008 article along these lines - http://kk.org/thetechnium/2008/09/thinkism/

So maybe ASI/AGI will be like a new life form, pure intelligence without consciousness / emotions...  So, ASI might just be a new tool for solving tasks, but not motivated to seek new tasks.  Well, Kelly does a better job of explaining it -
Quote
  The Singularity is an illusion that will be constantly retreating — always “near” but never arriving. We’ll wonder why it never came after we got AI. Then one day in the future, we’ll realize it already happened. The super AI came, and all the things we thought it would bring instantly — personal nanotechnology, brain upgrades, immortality — did not come. Instead other benefits accrued, which we did not anticipate, and took long to appreciate. Since we did not see them coming, we look back and say, yes, that was the Singularity.

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #289 on: April 03, 2015, 06:14:07 PM »

So maybe ASI/AGI will be like a new life form, pure intelligence without consciousness / emotions...

At first, sure, but is there any inherent reason to think that silicone neurons would be any more or less capable of consciousness or emotion than carbon ones?

I propose that to some sort of outside objective neutral observer, us humans would not look any different than complex AI.  We don't need to presume "consciousness" to explain our behavior.


Emotion is how our DNA gets us to act in it's best interest even when it goes against our own best interest (altruism, for example, or caring for children) while still giving us the intelligence to solve complex problems.

I expand on that theory more here: http://biodieselhauling.blogspot.com/2012/12/the-last-big-question.html if anyone's interested...


I think its a bit like claiming cats and dogs don't have consciousness.  There is no way to prove it either way, but it seems rather anthropocentric - or just conceited - to presume they don't. 
Kubric's final movie, AI, explores the (potential) distinction to be made someday between androids that have a self-preservation instinct programmed in for practical reasons and androids that actually feel. 

Maybe it won't happen, but what reason is there to think it couldn't??

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #290 on: April 04, 2015, 12:04:50 AM »
Just one more reason why super intelligent machines will one day rule the world.   The human operating system only runs on really slow and outdated hardware.

Maybe for pure thinking, but otherwise our "hardware" is still superior. It's highly autonomous and very reliable. There aren't any artificial systems yet which could run for 60-70 years non-stop and operate at peak performance for 30-40 years without any serious maintenance. We are very adaptable to the surrounding environment, perhaps more than any other multicellular organism as evidenced by our range. Is the human advantage over other animals just our superior brain? Would dogs rule the world if someone transplanted brains twice as powerful as ours to replace theirs? I don't see it because their bodies are not suitable for anything other than running. Other than the brain (very important of course) our advantages include highly dexterous hands capable of manipulating tiny objects precisely, excellent 3D eyesight and ability to make complex sounds for communication. Of course I'm not saying a robot couldn't do all those things (mimicking a human hand is still very difficult), but you would need the whole ecosystem with an appropriate energy source. The energy source probably being the most challenging issue. Perhaps the solution could be not something human like, but a swarm of semi-autonomous tiny objects (like ants or bees) who would be intelligent only when take as a whole and supplemented by a supercomputer in a basement somewhere. Who knows what the future will bring, the only thing I'm sure about is that we won't live in boring times.

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #291 on: April 04, 2015, 11:35:44 AM »

Quote
Many of the dreams Rosenblatt shared in his news conference have come true. Others, like computer consciousness, remain distant. The largest neural nets today have about a billion connections, 1,000 times the size of a few years ago. But that’s tiny compared with the brain. A billion connections is a cubic millimeter of tissue; in a brain scan, it’d be less than a voxel. We’re far from human intelligence. Hinton remains intrigued and inspired by the brain, but he knows he’s not recreating it. It’s not even close.

Of course the next logical statement is that if it is 1000 times the size of a few years ago, it may well be another 1000 times that size a few years from now.

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #292 on: April 04, 2015, 12:09:28 PM »

Quote
Many of the dreams Rosenblatt shared in his news conference have come true. Others, like computer consciousness, remain distant. The largest neural nets today have about a billion connections, 1,000 times the size of a few years ago. But that’s tiny compared with the brain. A billion connections is a cubic millimeter of tissue; in a brain scan, it’d be less than a voxel. We’re far from human intelligence. Hinton remains intrigued and inspired by the brain, but he knows he’s not recreating it. It’s not even close.

Of course the next logical statement is that if it is 1000 times the size of a few years ago, it may well be another 1000 times that size a few years from now.

More than that, if it's exponential.
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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #293 on: April 08, 2015, 10:29:17 PM »
Was biking home from a workout today and had a (possible?) bit of insight about the way technology is headed. 

We've spent the last few decades working on developing the digital realm using the physical realm (building software), and we are now seeing a shift.  The digital is becoming so well developed that we will now see how well we can develop the physical using digital technology (3d printing and robots for example).

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #294 on: April 09, 2015, 07:57:28 AM »
Was biking home from a workout today and had a (possible?) bit of insight about the way technology is headed. 

We've spent the last few decades working on developing the digital realm using the physical realm (building software), and we are now seeing a shift.  The digital is becoming so well developed that we will now see how well we can develop the physical using digital technology (3d printing and robots for example).

Sho nuff. We've spent the last X number of years (60,000?) conceptualizing the world through different methods. One of the most powerful being via mathematics; something that computers are exceptionally good at. As we've developed more precise and flexible tools we just give them over to our own physical representations of our conceptualization (computers). We're not at the point yet where we just ask for tea (earl grey hot), but we may be closer than we realize.

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #295 on: April 09, 2015, 08:10:02 AM »
Was biking home from a workout today and had a (possible?) bit of insight about the way technology is headed. 

We've spent the last few decades working on developing the digital realm using the physical realm (building software), and we are now seeing a shift.  The digital is becoming so well developed that we will now see how well we can develop the physical using digital technology (3d printing and robots for example).

Sho nuff. We've spent the last X number of years (60,000?) conceptualizing the world through different methods. One of the most powerful being via mathematics; something that computers are exceptionally good at. As we've developed more precise and flexible tools we just give them over to our own physical representations of our conceptualization (computers). We're not at the point yet where we just ask for tea (earl grey hot), but we may be closer than we realize.

No need to shave your head and wear a jumpsuit,
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/monsieur/monsieur-the-artificially-intelligent-robotic-bart
not sure if it is voice controlled or not but that part is becoming solved in other domains.  And if it can do booze extending it to teas cant be that bad either.

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #296 on: April 09, 2015, 10:17:07 AM »
And let's not forget the recently released Audi Autonomous Office Chair:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7JHop1juK4

Quote
Published on Mar 31, 2015
Intelligent, powerful and autonomous. The all-new Audi Autonomous Office Chair is here. Equipped with the latest piloted driving technology from Audi, the Audi Autonomous Office Chair takes the drudgery and effort out of getting around the office.

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #297 on: April 12, 2015, 06:43:04 AM »
Interesting but the article does not specify how the AI observed the video game state, was there some human made custom interface for each game or did they point a web camera at a screen?  The latter being much more impressive.  May have to scan the publication.  From my own work interfacing can be a huge pain.

The details (and then some) are in the 'Nature' article I cited a post or two later... "If you really want to geek out, here's the official publication in Nature:  http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v518/n7540/full/nature14236.html "

Quick answer, the AI 'read the pixels' directly from the screen (so it sorta has an inherent advantage over humans there).

cool, thanks.  Running at 60Hz (or what ever) is also a bit of an advantage, I cant press a button half that fast.

That's the reason that Watson won on Jeopardy. The computer could ring in before the humans were able to. The rules state that you can't ring in until after a light goes off at the end of the question, and as a computer, Watson was able to beat the humans to the buzzer through reaction time. The humans knew the answers most of the time (if you watch the clips you can see them trying to buzz in on almost every question). So it was really rigged towards the strength of being able to push the button faster. It's impressive that the machine was able to answer so many of the questions. But at the time I remember feeling that the game was unfairly rigged because of the special preference Watson had to be allowed the first try at nearly every question. Humans could only buzz in first if Watson didn't know or if they anticipated when the light would trigger. But if they anticipated wrong, they would be blocked from answering for long enough that Watson would surely ring in in time. But this was basically a big ad for IBM, with lots of paid IBM ads, and a big ratings draw for the show, so it's not surprising Jeopardy! was so accommodating.

http://www.newrepublic.com/article/83337/ibm-watson-computer-jeopardy
http://www.kurzweilai.net/the-buzzer-factor-did-watson-have-an-unfair-advantage

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #298 on: April 12, 2015, 07:30:15 AM »
Yeah, similarly, after I read the Nature article in depth, it is a similar 'let down'.  However, as an engineer at least, I appreciate how impressive it is to get 'close'.  Maybe it is a black and white problem (AI is very fragile); when AGI is near (AI becomes adaptable to gray/grey areas),  that is what I am keeping my eye on...

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #299 on: April 17, 2015, 07:40:16 PM »
These tests are good illustrations of how we're really not that close to having artificial intelligence being even nearly as smart or capable as a human. We could get there one day, but we have a long way to go.

http://io9.com/8-possible-alternatives-to-the-turing-test-1697983985