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Follow UsEric Auchard
NEW YORK: Robots are sure to be humanized the same way space aliens were made
into huggable, homesick little people in the epic, "E.T: The Search for
Extraterrestrial Intelligence." "He is the first robotic child,
programmed to love" runs Stephen Spielberg's upcoming film "Artificial
Intelligence" advertising promotion.
Life-like robots are everywhere - not just Hollywood movies but in Sony toy
dogs, cars that monitor and talk back to drivers, and mechanical eyes managing
factory production. The Internet is full of science fiction musings on how
machine intelligence might one day overcome the limits of human mind.
Critics say that machines will never actually think in the human sense, only
process bewildering amounts of data. Yet, the pace of advances has given
naysayers some pause. Debate is stoked by the emergence of powerful tools such
as artificial intelligence, bioengineering, and nanotechnology - computers that
work at the molecular level. These present both dangers and the potential to
transform the human condition.
Ray Kurzweil, an artificial intelligence pioneer, argues that computers are
rapidly outstripping human intelligence. "We will reverse-engineer the
human brain not simply because it is our destiny but because there is valuable
information to be found there that will provide insights in building more
intelligent machines," he predicts in a forthcoming book.
To be sure, machines can solve problems with billions, even trillions of
variables that no mind could begin to contemplate. But do they think, and
daresay, will they ever possess emotions?
Care to notice it or not, but artificial intelligence has become embedded in
everyday life. Telephone customer service calls are now often routed
automatically using computer-generated voices with life-like personalities.
Banks use neural network technology that mimics the human brain to automate
decision-making about loan applications.
So far, it's been pretty dumb
Artificial intelligence run amok has a long history that stretches back to Mary
Shelley's "Frankenstein" and Robert Louis Stevenson's "Dr. Jekyll
and Mr. Hyde."
It includes science fiction in the spirit of Arthur C. Clarke's "2001: A
Space Odyssey," which in the film version has HAL 9000, the almost
omniscient computer, telling his fellow space traveler: "I'm sorry Dave,
I'm afraid I can't do that." And who could forget John Schuck's hilarious
robot cop in the short-lived 1970s show "Holmes and Yoyo."
The road to ever-improving machine intelligence has been littered with
mundane inventions, some of which work, even if humorously. Computer
intelligence simulations have been in use since the 1960s when researchers built
software to solve simple algebra problems. Another program called Eliza offered
a comforting form of Rogerian humanistic therapy. Web readers can get free
analysis at http://pandi.20m.com/games/elizav2.html.
More recently, Professor Stuart Wilkinson of the University of South Florida
has coined the term "Gastrobots" (http://www.gastrobots.com
/), for intelligent machines that derive all their energy requirements from the
digestion of real food. Such a self-sustaining machine could endlessly mow the
lawn along roadsides, eating its own clippings.
The specter that self-replicating creatures could be created out of
nanotechnology, bioengineering and artificial intelligence to displace human
beings, has led Bill Joy, a top software pioneer with Sun Microsystems Inc. to
call for self-imposed limits on scientific research recently.
By contrast, Natasha Vita-More, a multimedia artist based in Marina del Rey,
California, has spent 20 years working at the intersection of science and art to
popularize ideas about artificial intelligence as a means of human liberation.
Her latest work, dubbed Primo 3M+, was developed with Kurzweil; Marvin Minsky,
"father of artificial intelligence;" and Ralph Merkle, an expert in
atomic-scale nanotechnology.
Vita-More's digital art piece is located on the Web at http://www.natasha.cc/primo3m+.htm.
The exhibit showcases dozens of possible human body enhancements. It is not a
robot, but a machine-enabled human being. "The reality is man and machine
are merging," said Vita-More.
Vita-More predicts the 21st century body will eventually offer the ability
for the ageless upgrade of human cells, with its skin impervious to damage from
sun rays. More radically, it may even come complete with batteries and
interchangeable sexuality as well as a computerized brain capable of storing,
preserving, and retrieving human memories.
Resistance is futile
The revolution now underway has led to the creation of speech recognition
software that costs $50, boasts a 100,000-word vocabulary, and has the ability
to understand continuous human speech. Fifteen years ago, a $5,000 package
recognized just 1,000 words, and could often not be understood.
Kurzweil should know, having helped invent text and speech recognition,
language translation, music synthesizers, and the first print-to-speech reading
machine for the blind. Kurzweil most recently authored "The Age of
Spiritual Machines."
"The whole history of computers is that as they become more complex,
they become simpler to use. It doesn't require human beings to become more
complicated," he said. To popularize his ideas, Kurzweil has helped create
the Cybernetic Poet, which composes workman-like poetry, seemingly at random.
His latest creation is Ramona, a virtual singer who can string together
interconnected thoughts in conversation.
Kurzweil maintains a comprehensive Web site at http://www.kurzweilAI.net with
links to these projects and a range of readings for students of artificial
intelligence. While the multiplication may be mind-boggling, he sees progress
within 50 years toward a computer that costs $1,000 with the power of 10 billion
human brains.
For Kurzweil, this is all merely a matter of time - 2030 he forecasts.
(C) Reuters Limited 2001.