Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!lll-winken!lll-tis!ames!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!rutgers!princeton!phoenix!pucc!RLWALD
From: RLWALD@pucc.Princeton.EDU (Robert Wald)
Newsgroups: comp.ai
Subject: Re: The future of AI - my opinion
Message-ID: <4923@pucc.Princeton.EDU>
Date: 12 Apr 88 04:33:54 GMT
References: <1348@hubcap.UUCP> <2070012@otter.hple.hp.com>
Reply-To: RLWALD@pucc.Princeton.EDU
Organization: Princeton University, NJ
Lines: 53
Disclaimer: Author bears full responsibility for contents of this article


In article <1348@hubcap.UUCP>, mrspock@hubcap.UUCP (Steve Benz) writes:
 
>  Isn't this exactly the Turing test (rather than the inverse?)
>A computer being just as human as a human?  Well, either way,
>the point is taken.
>
>  In fact, I agree with it.  I think that in order for a machine to be
>convincing as a human, it would need to have the bad qualities of a human
>as well as the good ones, i.e.  it would have to be occasionally stupid,
>arrogant, ignorant, etc.&soforth.
>
>  So, who needs that?  Who is going to sit down and (intentionally)
>write a program that has the capacity to be stupid, arrogant, or ignorant?
 
 
  I think that you are missing the point. Its because you're using charged
words to describe humans.
 
Ignorant: Well, I would certainly expect an AI to be ignorant of things
or combinations of things it hasn't been told about.
 
Stupid: People are stupid either because they don't have proper procedures
to deal with information, or because they are ignorant of the real meaning
of the information they do possess and thus use it wrongly. I don't see
any practical computer having some method of always using the right procedure,
and I've already said that I think it would be ignorant of certain things.
People think and operate by using a lot of heuristics on an incredible
amount of information. So much that it is probably hopeless to develop
perfect algorithms, even with a very fast computer. So i think that computers
will have to use these heuristics also.
  Eventually, we may develop methods that are more powerful and reliable
than humans. Computers are not subject to the hardware limitations of the
brain. But meanwhile I don't think that what you have mentioned are
'bad' qualities of the brain, nor unapplicable to computers.
 
Arrogance: It is unlikely that people will attempt to give computers
emotions for some time. On the other hand, I try not (perhaps
failing at times) to be arrogant or nasty. But as far as the turing
test is concerned, a computer which can parse real language could
conceivably parse for emotional content and be programmed to
respond. There may even be some application for this, so it may
be done. The only application for simulating arrogance production
might be if you are really trying to fool workers into thinking
their boss is a human, or at least trying to make them forget it
is a computer.
 
I'm not really that concerned with arrogance, but I think that an
AI could be very 'stupid' and 'ignorant'. Not ones that deal with limited
domains, but ones that are going to operate in the real world.
-Rob Wald                Bitnet: RLWALD@PUCC.BITNET
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"Why are they all trying to kill me?"
     "They don't realize that you're already dead."     -The Prisoner