Russell and William, OK, I think that I am finally beginning to "get it". No one here is really planning to do wonderful things that people can't reasonably do, though Russell has pointed out some improvements which I will comment on separately.
I am interested in things that people can NOT reasonably do. Note that many computer programs have been written to way outperform people in specific tasks, and my own Dr. Eliza would seem to far exceed human capability in handling large amounts of qualitative knowledge that work within its paradigm limits. Hence, it would seem that I may have stumbled into the wrong group (opinions invited). Continuing with comments on part of Russell's posting... On 6/26/08, Russell Wallace <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > Searching photographs without being limited to human labeling. Unsupervised learning? This could be really good for looking for strange things in blood samples. Now, I routinely order a "manual differential white count" that requires someone to manually look over the blood cells with a microscope. These typically cost ~US$25. Note that the routine counting of cell types in blood samples is already done by camera-driven AI programs in most labs. Design of physical artifacts. > Checking of human-created or machine-assisted designs. Something like AutoCAD's mechanical simulations? Watching a security camera feed, ignoring benign activity but alerting > a human operator in the event of suspicious activity. Present systems already highlight any changes. Programming robots to carry out tasks in e.g. transport and construction. Similar to the program-by-example programming that is used with present automobile welding robots? This stuff all sounds pretty puny compared to the awe-inspiring hype of the Singularity people, and there is already high-tech competition to AGIs for much of it. None of these things would seem to be worth any great social risk. None of these things would seem to be worth devoting anyone's life toward. Am I missing something here? I believe that a complete revolution in man's dealing with his problems is right here to be had. Dr. Eliza certainly illustrates that there is probably enough low hanging fruit to be worth immediately redesigning the Internet to collect it and promptly extend the lives of most of the people on Earth. However, my present interest is to NOT restrict the next generation Internet to a particular more advanced capability than is now had, but to either: 1. Figure out enough about problems and their solutions to do the job for once and for all time, or 2. Figure out how to do the job in an open-ended sort of way so that capability can grow as we figure out more about solving problems. Unfortunately, no one here appears to be interested in understanding this landscape of solving future hyper-complex problems, but instead apparently everyone wishes to leave this work to some future AGI, that cannot possibly be constructed in the short time frame that I have in mind. Of course, future AGIs are doomed to fail at such efforts, just as people have failed for the last million years or so. Steve Richfield ------------------------------------------- agi Archives: http://www.listbox.com/member/archive/303/=now RSS Feed: http://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/303/ Modify Your Subscription: http://www.listbox.com/member/?member_id=8660244&id_secret=106510220-47b225 Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
