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From: levy@ttrdc.UUCP (Daniel R. Levy)
Newsgroups: net.ai
Subject: Re: "The Knowledge"
Message-ID: <862@ttrdc.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 9-May-86 01:02:09 EDT
Article-I.D.: ttrdc.862
Posted: Fri May  9 01:02:09 1986
Date-Received: Sun, 11-May-86 16:39:18 EDT
References: <275@euclid.warwick.UUCP> <5500032@uiucdcsb>
Organization: AT&T, Computer Systems Division, Skokie, IL
Lines: 35

In article <5500032@uiucdcsb>, schraith@uiucdcsb.CS.UIUC.EDU writes:
>  It seems to me that if AI researchers wish to build a system which
>  has any versatility, it will have to be able to learn, probably
>  in a similar manner to the taxicab drivers.  Bierre states this problem:
>  "Organize a symbolic recording of an ongoing stream of fly-by
>  sensory data, on the fly, such that at any given time as much as
>  possible can be quickly remembered of the entire stream."
>  Surely computer professionals have better things to do, ultimately,
>  than spoonfeed all the knowledge to a computer it will ever need.

As nothing but an interested observer in this discussion (I am in no
wise an AI guru, so please forgive me if I bumble) your observation
indeed makes sense me, that an A.I. system could well do better by
"learning" than by having all its "smarts" hardcoded in beforehand.
But it also seems possible that once a computer system HAS been
"trained" in this way, it should be quite easy to mass produce as
many equally capable copies of that system as desired; just dump its
"memory" and reload it on other systems.

Any comments?  Does a "learning" system (or one that knows how to teach
itself) indeed hold more promise than distilling expert human knowledge 
and hardcoding it in?  Perhaps I've answered my own question, that the
system that can "learn" is better able to adapt to new developments in
the area it is supposed to be "intelligent" in than one which is static.
Maybe the best of both worlds could apply (the distilled human knowledge
coded in as a solid base, but the system is free to expand on that base
as it "learns" more and more)?
-- 
 -------------------------------    Disclaimer:  The views contained herein are
|       dan levy | yvel nad      |  my own and are not at all those of my em-
|         an engihacker @        |  ployer or the administrator of any computer
| at&t computer systems division |  upon which I may hack.
|        skokie, illinois        |
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