RE: [agi] AI on TV

[Gary Miller]

Title: Message

On Dec. 9 Kevin said:   "It seems to me that building a strictly "black box" AGI that only uses text or graphical input\output can have tremendous implications for our society, even without arms and eyes and ears, etc.  Almost anything can be designed or contemplated within a computer, so the need for dealing with analog input seems unnecessary to me.  Eventually, these will be needed to have a complete, human like AI.  It may even be better that these first AGI systems will not have vision and hearing because it will make it more palatable and less threatening to the masses...."   I agree wholeheartedly.  Sony and Honda as well as several military contractors are spending 10s perhaps hundreds of million dollars  on R&D robotics programs which incorporate the vision, and analog control, and data acquisition for industry, the military, and yes even the toy companies.    Once AGIs are ready to fly it will be able to interface with these systems through software APIs (Application Programming Interfaces) and will not even care about the low-level programs that enable them move about and visually survey their environments.   Too often those who seek the spotlight are really sincere, but either need recognition for their own self reassurance or as a method of attracting potential funding.   There seems to be an unwritten law in the universe which that says all major inventions will involve major sacrifice and loss for those who dare to tackle what has been deemed impossible by others.  From Galileo to Edison, to Tesla, to maybe one of us.  Before we succeed, if we succeed, the universe will exact it's toll.  For nature will not give up her secrets willingly and intelligence may be her most closely guarded secret of all!    Don't forget that genius and madness sometimes walk arm in arm!     And as the man says if you weren't cazy when you got in, you probably will be before you get out!. -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] On Behalf Of maitri Sent: Monday, December 09, 2002 11:08 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: [agi] AI on TV There was a show on the tube last night on TechTV.  It was part of their weekly Secret, Strange and True series.  They chronicled three guys who are working on creating advanced AI.    One guy was from Belgium.  My apologies to him if he reads this list, but he was a rather quirky and stressed character.  He had designed a computer that was basically a collection of chips.  He raised a million and had it built on spec.  I gather he was expecting something to miraculously emerge from this collection, but alas, nothing did.  It was really stressful watching his stress.  He had very high visibility in the country and the pressure was immense as he promised a lot.  I have real doubts about his approach, even though I am a lay-AI person.  Also, its clear from watching him that its sometimes good to have shoestring budgets and low visibility.  Less stress and more forced creativity in your approach...   The second guy was from either England or the states, not sure.  He was working out of his garage with his wife.  He was trying to develop robot AI including vision, speech, hearing and movement.  He was clearly floundering as he radically redesigned what he was doing probably a dozen times during the 1 hour show.  I think this experimentation has value.  But I really wonder if large scale trial and error will result in AGI.  I don't think so.  I think trial and error will, of course, be essential during development, but T and E of the entire underlying architecture seems a folly to me.  Since the problem is SO immense, I believe one must start with a very sound and detailed game plan that can be tweaked as things move along.   The last guy was brooks at MIT.  They were developing a robot with enhanced vision capabilities.  They also failed miserably.  I am rather glad that they did. They re funded by DOD, and are basically trying to build a robotic killing machine.  Just what we need.   It seems to me that trying to tackle the vision problem is too big of a place to start.  While all this work will have value down the line, is it essential to AGI?  It seems to me that building a strictly "black box" AGI that only uses text or graphical input\output can have tremendous implications for our society, even without arms and eyes and ears, etc.  Almost anything can be designed or contemplated within a computer, so the need for dealing with analog input seems unnecessary to me.  Eventually, these will be needed to have a complete, human like AI.  It may even be better that these first AGI systems will not have vision and hearing because it will make it more palatable and less threatening to the masses....   The show was rather discouraging, especially if one considers that these three folks are leading the way towards AGI.  As for me, I think others in the field are alot further along...Nonetheless, I'm sure the show will be rerun and may be a worthwhile watch for those here...   Kevin

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