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Tough luck geeks, we’re still smarter than silicon

Christopher Scanlon

by Christopher Scanlon

15 Jun 05:45am

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Filed under: Chess, Computers, Intelligence, Technology

82 comments

For a smart guy, Steve Wozniak — the man who, with Steve Jobs, co-founded Apple — has some pretty dumb ideas. Speaking at a business meeting on the Gold Coast recently, Wozniak claimed that machines are becoming more intelligent than humans.

Wozniak was reported to have said ‘We’re already creating the superior beings, I think we lost the battle to the machines long ago. We’re going to become the pets, the dogs of the house.”

In Wozniak’s eyes, humans are going to become mere spectators to the doings of machines. ‘Every time we create new technology we’re creating stuff to do the work we used to do and we’re making ourselves less meaningful, less relevant’, he said.

In nerd-speak, this is called ‘the singularity’: a threshold when computer processing power becomes so powerful that it surpasses the processing power of the human brain. At that point, we have artificial intelligence where machines think, act and feel like humans.

No doubt this seems reasonable to people who spend much of their lives with their heads stuck in the abstract world of high-end computing. But to the rest of us, the idea of the singularity is just plain silly. Not only does it show an astounding ignorance about what intelligence is, but also a radical — and potentially dangerous — contempt for humanity.

Claims about the rise of intelligent machines have a long and inglorious history. As philosopher Hubert Dreyfus documents in his 1992 book What Computers Still Can’t Do, in the 1960s artificial intelligence experts were confidently predicting intelligent machines by the end of that decade. When we missed that deadline, our relegation to the status of Lassie was pushed back to the 70s.

As the years came and each prediction went unfulfilled, the timeframes were pushed back further and further into the future.

Alternatively, artificial intelligence experts revised what they meant by an intelligent machine. Instead of a computer with the capacity for language, for instance, they settled instead for teaching a machine to play chess. And, when a computer did finally manage to beat a chess Grand Master, as IBM’s Deep Blue did in 1997, beating Garry Kasparov, it seemed that the age of intelligent machines had finally arrived.

The problem, though, is that describing Deep Blue as intelligent debases what most people mean by intelligence. The fact that Kasparov could walk out of the room after the chess and game and pour himself a cup of tea — in addition to playing a mean game of chess — ought to show us that there is more intelligence in a single human hand gesture than all the computer chips in the world.

In other words, intelligence isn’t reducible to processing power as the Wozniaks of the world would like to think. While doing one thing very well is nice, intelligence is having the capacity to do lots of things across multiple contexts. The only way to describe Deep Blue intelligent is to first dumb-down intelligence.

Wacky ideas about intelligent machines might not be a problem if they were confined to a bunch of Silicon Valley programmers who really ought get out more. But, increasingly, the running down of intelligence to artificially inflate how intelligent machines are is becoming commonplace — and it affects us all.

As Jaron Lanier writes in his recent book You Are Not A Gadget, ‘People degrade themselves in order to make machines seem smart all the time. Before the [global financial] crash, bankers believed in supposedly intelligent algorithms that could calculate credit risk before making bad loans. We ask teachers to teach to standardized tests so a student will look good to an algorithm.’

Lest this be dismissed as the rantings of someone who thinks computers are the devil’s handiwork, it ought to be noted that Lanier is no slouch when it comes to technology. He’s described as ‘the father of virtual reality technology’ and he rubs shoulders with the elite of Silicon Valley.

Lanier’s examples could be expanded. Talk about precision-guided ‘smart bombs’ and unmanned drones washes over us, as if machines have magically minimised civilian deaths in war. It all sounds very clear-cut and clinical, but news of innocent men, women and children being killed because of incorrect information supplied by unmanned predator drones in Afghanistan tell a different story.

We have been able to build machines that create the impression of awareness, but calling them ‘intelligent’ is pretty dumb. If we’re to avoid a future in which we hand over political, economic, cultural questions, with all the moral and ethical challenges these bring, we need to stop abasing ourselves before technology and re-assert the primacy of the human.

Christopher Scanlon teaches journalism at La Trobe University and is a co-founder of upstart.net.au.

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82 comments

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    • Erick says:

      06:03am | 15/06/11

      Also, heavier-than-air flight is impossible.

      Reply

    • Dave Sag says:

      11:49am | 15/06/11

      OMFG I agree with Erick! (or at least with the sarcastic point he’s making).

      Machine intelligence is looming much closer now we have a genuine, and testable (and so far the tests pass) theory of what intelligence actually is.  Mr Scanlon shows his age (and his lack of currency with the latest research) by referring to ‘Artificial Intelligence.’ Those of us who work (or dabble in my case) in this realm call it Machine Intelligence these days, accepting that there is nothing artificial about it.

      Sure, machines won’t think like people, just as a 747 doesn’t fly like a bird, but the theory is sound, the key points have been demonstrated successfully (There’s plenty of good TED talks on this for the uninitiated) and it seriously won’t be long before $1000 can buy more computational ability than a human mind.  A few more years and $1000 will buy the computational equivalent to all human minds — yay for exponential growth.  And somewhere between now and then we’ll put those machines in charge and get on with our new status as the domestic pets of our technology.  I for one welcome our new machine overlords.

    • Erick says:

      12:10pm | 15/06/11

      It took 3,000,000,000 years for natural life to evolve human intelligence.

      Programmable computers have existed for just 70 years, and there is no end in sight to their potential. To claim that all possible avenues for development have been exhausted, when the technology is still in its infancy, is naive at best.

    • Vince says:

      12:21pm | 15/06/11

      @Dave Sag - here’s an idea, why don’t you go drill a comfortable sized hole in your favourite laptop, dress it pink and marry it.

    • Craig says:

      01:09pm | 15/06/11

      Wow, I agree with Erick!

      Not to mention this is the second article I’ve read this week that gets what the ‘Singularity’ is wrong.  It’s the point at which the speed of technological advancement approaches infinity, not the point at which computers can pour themselves cups of tea.  You can agree that the idea is silly, but not quite as silly as not checking your facts before submitting your article to The Punch!

    • Erick says:

      01:11pm | 15/06/11

      After creating artificial intelligence, the next step would be developing artificial stupidity. I don’t think machines are ever likely to be able to match Vince.

    • Jimmy says:

      07:34am | 15/06/11

      My laptop was basically telling me how intelligent it and I was a slave to it,I remonstrated, nothing but arrogance and ridicule was it’s response, I switched it off. I now taunt it with threats of banishment to the shed along with other intelligent obsolete electrical items such as juicers and waffle irons,older mobiles littering the desolate graveyard that is the back corner of obscurity a baron lonely place,a large cardboard cutout dalek is the keeper of this awful place and does with them at his will,I have triumphed over intelligence

      Reply

    • acotrel says:

      07:49am | 15/06/11

      If Steve Wozniak says it, it must be true?  What a load of absolute crap! My computer is like my dog - it does what it is told to do! When you abdicate and lose control you’re simply being stupid.

    • Keats says:

      07:40am | 15/06/11

      Your comment: No wonder journalism is screwed when lecturers in it write turgid stuff like this. Makes me wonder if a computer penned it.

      Reply

    • acotrel says:

      07:45am | 15/06/11

      I call bullshit!  When a computer can create the euivalent of a Da Vinci, Van Gogh, or Lautrec painting, I’ll be impressed.  (new meaning for the term ‘impressionist’?)  How about we dash off a few new Monet’s for Southerby’s next auction - they should sell well? We could also create a few new Mozart Symphonies to play while they’re being sold? Some of these geeks don’t have emotions themselves, and come to resemble computers - cannot recognise their importance?

      Reply

    • Dave Sag says:

      12:12pm | 15/06/11

      It’s not whether a machine could create a work of art (or engineering) or not, it’s whether that machine could appreciate the work as art, or be moved by a symphony.  Given there is no magic, no ‘soul’, it stands to reason that conscious sentience, capable of qualia, must emerge from a physical basis — that mush we call our minds — and so there is no reason at al why machines could not share in that.  I look forward to sharing a world with machines that are much much smarter than we are.  Maybe we can stop arguing about global warming then.

    • fml says:

      01:14pm | 15/06/11

      What if the machines come to the conclusion that they are the cause of global warming?

    • Matthew says:

      01:31pm | 15/06/11

      Dave Sag, our brains are just electrical signals.  The same as in a computer.  There’s even computer hardware that’s modelled on the human brain.

      The true test of intelligence is when a computer can ‘learn’ as well as humans.

      acotrel, I ask you…can you create the equivalent of a Da Vinci or Van Gogh?  The computer is trying to be human and you’re a human so if it reaches your standard than it is a success.

    • Drafnel says:

      04:55pm | 15/06/11

      Dave and Matthew, Science doesn’t tell us that there IS no ‘soul’, nor that our brains are ‘just’ electrical signals. Science sensibly limits itself to that which it can detect and deal with, and it has nothing to say about that which it cannot detect and deal with. To say that’s ‘all there is’ is a philosophical, nay indeed religious, argument. It is not a statement of fact. By all means make your claims, but please be rational and honest enough to admit that you’re arguing your own religious belief which may or may not be ‘the truth’.

    • Bilby says:

      07:50am | 15/06/11

      I totally agree. Let’s start by admitting that any attempt to model something as complex as the climate is completely invalid, therefore any evidence for AGW derived from said models are crap and NOT to be relied upon.

      I challenge anyone (and I’ve tried this on global warming scientists and they’ve failed, so good luck), to demonstrate why I should pay any attention to a model that contains a mere fraction of the variables required, and will never have enough data available. A computer model can be fudged when incomplete data is available, but you can’t then read anything into the results achieved.

      Reply

    • acotrel says:

      08:47am | 15/06/11

      @Bilby Any scientific measurement , including those derived from models is always accompanied by an error analysis, which defines accuracy and precision.  There should never be the stuation where the results are affected by an individual’s personal preference.  And in any scientific activity that sort of unprofessional behavour is easily detected by the peer group.  Scientists are trained to handle uncertainties, and the fact that armchair experts use them as a basis for argument shows their lack of knowledge of the various disciplines involved.

    • Bilby says:

      09:30am | 15/06/11

      “There should never be the stuation where the results are affected by an individual’s personal preference.”

      Unfortunately that’s just not possible. Models, built by people, will always reflect personal preferences. There is no such thing as a neutral model. Currently the major area of personal preference is in the feedback effects, for which there is no agreement. As we’re talking about a chaotic system, small changes in not only initial conditions, but also in feedback strength cause large swings in the outcome.

      Currently all models have been shown to be fudged in one way or another so as to pass certain tests (no such thing as a neutral model), and none have any value what so ever in predicting the future.

      The IPCC is quite open about the large deficiencies in their models, and the fact that thus far all have failed. Unfortunately they still use the data, reducing their credibility to around zero.

    • SydSteve says:

      03:46pm | 15/06/11

      @ Bilby, the scientific community is more than 1 person for a good reason. There is noone out there that knows everything about anything. Thats why there are different fields. The proof for climate change is made up of a large body of research that covers a broad spectrum.

    • Bilby says:

      04:37pm | 15/06/11

      SydSteve - Of course there is more than one person, but models are not built by the community, they are built by individuals.

      Like standards, the best thing about models is that there are so many to choose from.

    • acotrel says:

      05:11am | 16/06/11

      @Bilby I worked as a scientist for 40 years.  It is a discipline where you must divorce yourself from test results and maintain an unbiassed, and particularly apolitical approach.  If you don’t, you are simply wasting your time.  You wouldn’t be a scientist, you’d just be your typical sycophant, prostituting yourself.  Almost without exception scientists are not like that.  In the last few years the incidence of scientist faking results has been almost non-existent.  I can only think of one tiime that it ever happened and got into the media. It was a quality control chemist working for a drug company, and he was from a race noted for telling you what you want to hear. That sort of thing is extremely rare.

    • Condor says:

      08:06am | 15/06/11

      Wow, your lack of imagination and foresight is astounding. The earth is flat! The earth is flat! The earth is flat!

      There are many jobs done by machines and computers these days that used to be done by humans.

      This is only going to increase.

      Personally, I can’t wait until computers and machines are cooking my dinner, cleaning my house and doing my, and everyone else’s, job. That means I’ll be able to kick back and watch TV all day because there’s no need to go out and earn a living because money is now obsolete (all the methonds of production are done by machines so we’re no longer paying people for their labour).

      Bring it on!

      Reply

    • Wayne Kerr says:

      09:33am | 15/06/11

      “There are many jobs done by machines and computers these days that used to be done by humans”

      The difference here is that these machines are only following “instructions”.  It doesn’t mean they are intelligent or can think for themselves.

      Would you call a bicycle intelligent just becuase it goes left when you turn the handle bars? 

      As for the being able to kick back becuase money is obsolete.  There will always be a cost to producing a good or service and if you’re not working to earn money I can’t imagine your kicking back lifestyle will be all that good.

    • acotrel says:

      09:35am | 15/06/11

      @Condor Are you also going to replace your wife with a computer in the bedroom? Have you seen the movie ‘West World’ with Yul Brynner?  You’ll get yours, Jimmy!

    • Reggie says:

      11:15am | 15/06/11

      The various stealth aircraft would simply not fly except that computers do such a better job than a human can. Assuming always that the sensors are operating and accurate—the accuracy and speed of corrections allow them to operate ever closer to the threshold of instability and this provides an advantage in maneuverability. .

      We have to match the brain to the requirements of the task or it’s a choice between break-down or wasted ability. That goes for granny in the gigantic FWD or the over-enthusiastic pilot who managed to rip-off the tail of his aircraft simply because he didn’t know he could.

      The bicycle mention from WK reminds me that the ship’s wheel was once turned to the left in order to turn right. (They had to change that for some reason.) Speaking of bike-riding, let’s pay homage to that awful human failure of staring incredulous at the rock we’re trying to avoid, thus ensuring that we ALWAYS hit it. The trick is to look away. smile

    • St. Michael says:

      11:41am | 15/06/11

      @ acotrel:

      “Have you seen the movie ‘West World’ with Yul Brynner?”

      Draw.
      Draw.
      Draw.
      Draw.

      Reminds me of a joke I heard once:

      “Attention.  This is your pilot speaking.  This aircraft is fully automated.  There are no humans in the cockpit.  The plane flies by artificial intelligence.  It is the pinnacle of human technology, the state of the art.  Do not be alarmed.  There is nothing that can go wrong.  Go wrong.  Go wrong.  Go wrong.”

    • RyaN says:

      01:17pm | 15/06/11

      @St. Michael: well considering that up to 80% of all aircraft accidents “can only be attributable to human error”, I guess the “Go wrong.  Go wrong” line is quite ironic.

    • Matthew says:

      01:45pm | 15/06/11

      Actually RyaN, 100% is due to human error.  Not only is the human pilot but the person that made most of the components OR the person that made the robot that built most of the components.

      Reggie, humans regularly fly beyond the limits of planes because the limits of plane are often calculated significantly under what they can be.  A good pilot shouldn’t operate past the limits but sometimes they do (either by accident or because its their only option).  There’s a reason Boeing and Airbus are moving away from computer controlled flight where possible as it stops pilots doing something that could be safe (but might not be required during normal flying).

    • Addy says:

      08:07am | 15/06/11

      Thank-you. You have clearly expressed what I have been feeling about the whole ‘singularity’ concept. Can we seriously code emotional intelligence, the ability to react to a situation emotinally rather than rationally? This is what makes us human.

      Reply

    • acotrel says:

      08:51am | 15/06/11

      @Addy If we want to code our emotions, we’d need lie detectors wired up to the computer!  I call bullshit! Alternatively we could transplant a human brain to live inside the black box.

    • Lostie says:

      09:13am | 15/06/11

      Maybe it would be better if we trained humans to react rationally rather than irrationally, logically rather than illogically, and with honesty, integrity and respect.

      But I agree, it is our flaws that make us human.

    • Reggie says:

      11:18am | 15/06/11

      You speak as if irrationality was not a normal human trait. How dare you.

    • Erick says:

      11:57am | 15/06/11

      “Can we seriously code emotional intelligence, the ability to react to a situation emotinally rather than rationally?”

      Why should we need to? Humans developed all those capabilities without coding.

    • Andrew says:

      12:26pm | 15/06/11

      What I find funny is that these commentors are so sure of themselves; they KNOW that human intelligence can’t be simulated. There is a lot of amazing work (some would also say scary) with regards to mapping the human brain and I have no idea what our capacity is with regards to making true artificial intelligence.

      I’ve seen work where scientist have been attaching light emitting organic material to individual brain cells all throughout the brain so that when an electric pulse runs through it it emits light. This builds a framework for us to be able to map the brain in a series of on and off’s. The cell is either active (emits light) or inactive (no light). This can then be put into the form of 1’s and 0’s and therefor we will be able to map the brain in binary. There is obviously a long way to go (and of course simply may not be possible) before we have true artificial intelligence but to so easily dismiss the idea is laughable.

      The other oversite with this article and it’s comments is that for us to become “the pets” doesn’t particularly mean that the computers need to be self aware or have true intelligence. It could simply mean that computers and robotics have advanced to such a stage that they are capable of doing most of the jobs that we would do.

      My personal opinion is that it is possible to map the human brain digitally and also that advancements in computational power will lead to computers with the capacity greater than that of a human brain. As to wether or not it’s possible to bring these two together and create truly intelligent digital machines I’ve no idea. I simply don’t know nor do I have enough information to make an educated guess.

      If we can though it can then get a bit scary. If we create something more intelligent than ourselves it stands to reason that it can then create something more intelligent than itself. You can see where I am going with this. So the upper limit of intelligence will either be what is physically possible within the laws of physics or potentially one of the creations will be smart enough to realise creating something more intelligent then itself is a bad idea.

      Nonetheless, it’s exciting to think about the possibility of what we can do even if it’s to our demise.

    • fml says:

      02:58pm | 15/06/11

      Erick,

      “Why should we need to? Humans developed all those capabilities without coding”

      Are you sure about that? how exactly does the brain work? the brain is a neural network, it responds to stimuli, certain stimuli send electrical signals to neurons in the brain, the brain sends a response to the body.

      Sections of the brain and the neurons within them encode respond to stimuli. Sounds like the basics of coding to me.

    • Jekub says:

      03:13pm | 15/06/11

      I’m a rational Human being, or at least thats what it said on the Box.

    • Erick says:

      03:44pm | 15/06/11

      Fml, who coded that?

      Oh, right, nobody coded it. It evolved.

      Unless, of course, you believe a sky fairy did all the coding.

    • fml says:

      04:18pm | 15/06/11

      Erick,

      DNA is a code, it encodes for proteins, Man did not create it, nor did the sky fairy, it evolved.

      Retort?

    • Bilby says:

      04:23pm | 15/06/11

      Addy - “Can we seriously code emotional intelligence”

      Of course we can, but why on earth would we want to? No toast this morning, the toaster is sulking because I turned the heater on first.

      Erick - Why should we need to? Well… I guess we *could* wait millions of years for it to happen by accident.

      Also, the suggestion that there was a designer is not altogether ridiculous when you see that we have a mechanism whereby the entire layout of a human body can be stated in defined code. That’s just the way we’d do it. God in the image of man once again, but still.

    • fml says:

      04:42pm | 15/06/11

      Sorry Erick,

      Misread what you wrote. I think i just like arguing with you.

    • Brendan says:

      08:41am | 15/06/11

      While I agree computers are not “smart” yet, I think about how they have advanced since I was a kid in the 80s. 

      We (well the clever guys and girls of the World) have compressed what it took nature to develop in millions of years of evolution into a few short decades.  How much further will they go in the next few?

      Reply

    • Richard Dawkins says:

      11:09am | 15/06/11

      You mean like changing the characteristics of dogs through selective breeding?

    • Brendan says:

      11:48am | 15/06/11

      Exactly Richard! But look at how far computers have come in that short time.  If we could do that with dogs, my husky would be doing the dishes each night instead of sitting around the house begging for a treat.

    • acotrel says:

      08:55am | 15/06/11

      If Steve Wozniak is so confident in his computers’ abilities,  let him wire up his bank account so that it is voice operated through the computer which detects lies, when people answer it’s questions.

      Reply

    • Brendan says:

      11:26am | 15/06/11

      But doesn’t your comment confuse what is presently possible with what may be possible in the future.

      Its a bit like saying “if Mr Gatling is so confident about his repeating gun, let him stand there and fight a company of men with muskets”. 

      Mr Gatling might not have been able, but less than a hundred years later, I bet Mr Kalashnikov would have been game, .

    • Cloud Strife says:

      08:56am | 15/06/11

      Well, Judgement Day hasn’t happened yet, but I am still wary of super computers called Skynet.

      Reply

    • Fiona says:

      09:38am | 15/06/11

      Or networks calling themselves the matrix

    • St. Michael says:

      11:43am | 15/06/11

      @ Fiona: you must’ve had a hard time watching the original Transformers cartoon movie.  It’s an Autobot Matrix of Leadership, remember.

    • d says:

      09:03am | 15/06/11

      Never say never.

      How do you know that this is impossible? After all the human being is just a biological computer. I am sorry to say that when you die there is nothing more out there for you.

      If you want a good scare look into nano machienes

      Live your life now and enjoy the time that you have.

      Reply

    • Andrew says:

      09:10am | 15/06/11

      The only way to create “intelligent” machines is to create a machine that can go out and find its own energy supplies and whatever else it needs for its continual capacity to function, as well as being able to avoid any predators and also to procreate given that even a machine must eventually decay into a rust bucket. Anything else is nothing but a glorified self cross referencing book.

      Reply

    • Lostie says:

      09:11am | 15/06/11

      I’m not even sure of the point of this rambling piece.

      You refrain, delicately, from defining intelligence which seems to be the keystone of your position.

      If we consider intelligence as “capacity for learning, reasoning, understanding, and similar forms of mental activity; aptitude in grasping truths, relationships, facts, meanings, etc.” [1]

      Lets look at hear point:

      Learning - the capacity of a computer program to learn is limited only by the restrictions imposed by the programmer. There are samples of code out there that predict behaviour - they use a knowledge base that far surpasses the individual experience of any one person and they add to that database every time they interact with another person. That they can do this 24/7, without memory loss, demonstrates superior learning.

      Reasoning - unlike humans who are horrible at assessing risk (look at all of the gamblers out there), of considering consequences and of acknowledging facts, computers have none of these limitations. Again, their limitations are reality, that which can be seen, observed, replicated identified. Unless programmed imperfectly, the reasoning of computers is perfect, uncontaminated by preconceived notions, bias or preference.

      Understanding - without the bias, preference and flaws of humans, computers are completely at ease with the idea of accepting that which is observed and finding a justification for it. Like the pigeons in a skinner box, they will repeat a behaviour seeking a desired outcome and, when the outcome is achieved, with repeat that behaviour.

      With a little clever programming they can be trained to seek simpler or more accurate explanations by analysing data and modifying responses (unlike the pigeon which is reactive) 

      Computers are capable of intelligence that is unavailable to humans, even our greatest minds are restrained by processing power, memory and distractions that do not contaminate a computer’s learning.

      Whether they will replace humans entirely, probably not, but intelligence - there’s no competition.


      [1] Definition from Dictionary.com

      Reply

    • fml says:

      10:04am | 15/06/11

      So I, the computer scientist is supposed to be told what is possible in the field of computer science by a two-bit journo with a phd in politics.

      Righto. You do know it is ever so dangerous to make assumptions about the future based on what we know today. examples? People used to think only 64k of RAM would be enough (gates has stated he never said that) also the president of IBM, Thomas J Watson said “I think there is a world market for maybe five computers,”.

      With the refinement of Neural networks and genetic algorithms, “Learning Machines” Will be possible.

      I know what you are going to say, you are going to argue philosophically that it will be impossible for a computer to learn human emotion. Well unless humans can physically describe how human emotion works then this will be a difficult task, but, i am not going to put this down to a failure of computer science, i am putting it down to a flaw in the human condition.

      I argue that if it is feasible for a human to recognise an emotion, but its perfectly acceptable that any action by the human when in that emotional state is considered to part of that emotion, then as long as the machine recognises the emotion then that machine would be considered to be somewhat human. Essentially what i am arguing is that human actions during an emotional state vary considerably enough that the definitions of human emotion are undefinable to the extent that many humans cannot define emotion past the initial feeling, that what ever actions the machine recognises will be considered an human emotion, Hell, it may even tell us things about ourselves that we are unable to define.

      Reply

    • Wayne Kerr says:

      10:39am | 15/06/11

      There was a very good programme on SBS last night;

      http://www.sbs.com.au/documentary/program/intothemind

      In this programme they showed that what we know as logical decision making is actually governed by emotion.  They had an example of an American man who had part of his brain taken out, for want of a better word, due to a tumour.  Following his operation he had no emotional feeling, he could only remember emotions and how he should respond to certain situations.  In an experiment created by Antonio Dimasio (plenty of links if you google him) he showed human emotions actually rule decision making rather than logic.  Compared to a person who could still feel emotion, the guy who couldn’t feel emotions did not perform very well on a test that on the surface you would think would be all logical reasoning.

      So to finally get to the point, yes I think it would be impossible for a computer to learn human emotion and further to that logical resoning is closely linked to emtional reasoning.

    • Bev says:

      01:05pm | 15/06/11

      @Wayne Kerr Their was an equally good one on economics.  Economists developed precise mathamatical models from Adam Smiths original work.  Trouble is they cannot predict bubbles and the crashes they cause.  Present work is demonstrating that emotion plays a much larger part in peoples monitary transactions than the rational economical model.  They showed a series of experiments which duplicated bubbles and found that people made emotional decisions even when all the facts were available.  Most interesting was an experiment to auction a $20 bill.  Its final price $28! The participants knew $20 was $20 but were willing to pay more for emotional reasons like winning.  All the math in the world cannot explain that.

    • fml says:

      02:11pm | 15/06/11

      Mr Wayne,

      My point was that human emotion is so undefinable, all the machine has to do is recognise a situation that emotion can possibly occur. This is possible because human emotion is so wildly undefined in humans.

      It is possible for a human to feel anger, but be outwardly stoic. The emotions are/should be determined by the outward actions. In humans we can feel emotion on the inside and not outwardly show the emotion.

      So with a neural network and an ever increasing expert system, which is constantly being updated based on weights, programming emotion is possible. You have to remember all the brain is, is a large neural network which sends electrical signals to various parts of the body as a response to an external influence. We humans really are not that special.

    • Tchom says:

      10:37am | 15/06/11

      And exactly which hyperadvanced miracle of technology was Apple responsible for? Their strength isn’t in technology anymore. Its in design and branding

      Reply

    • Bilby says:

      11:17am | 15/06/11

      No-one brings computing power to the masses like Apple. They’re philosophy of no choice but everything works has had a huge effect on technological acceptance, from the Apple II series right up to the iPhone/iPad. I don’t personally use their products as I believe in a more competitive market, but credit where credit’s due.

      Of course without Flash support they’ll always be second rate but I understand that some people would rather a half arsed device than let go of the skivvy. Such is life.

    • Reggie says:

      11:35am | 15/06/11

      Why should this come as a surprise? The US is not known for being inventive but more for innovation and improvement of other peoples’ inventions.

      Ever on the look-out for inventions they can value add. That part that Australian industry has always been so dismally slow to seize, preferring instead to train staff for the catering and tourist trade. Preferring always to be someone else’s servant ‘cos you only have to punse around not spilling the drinks and whinging about tight-arsed Aussies not tipping.

    • Ian says:

      11:29am | 15/06/11

      Scanlon’s obviously scared about machines being more intelligent than he is. No doubt he’d be the first to start shooting down androids that might be human-like.  The problem with Scanlon’s argument is that it’s like listening to people declaring that human flight is impossible; it’s impossible to fly to the moon; it’s impossible to travel under water etc etc.

      The key for computer scientists working in AI will be the day they are able to create emotional responses. It might not happen in the next decade but it will happen and probably sooner than later.

      Reply

    • Harquebus says:

      11:29am | 15/06/11

      You can hardly call yourself a geek if you are stupid enough to use that Flash crap.

      Reply

    • Bilby says:

      11:49am | 15/06/11

      Absolutely. Geeks are socially maladjusted misfits, whereas people that use Flash are totally righteous dudes that will inherit the universe. Each to they’re own I guess.

    • Harquebus says:

      12:26pm | 15/06/11

      @Bilby. Don’t forget stupid.

    • Bill Gates says:

      12:30pm | 15/06/11

      Peak Oil !!!

    • Bilby says:

      12:42pm | 15/06/11

      Harquebus - Stupid like a fox!

    • St. Michael says:

      01:25pm | 15/06/11

      Flash is Skynet.  The rest of the world bar Harquebus and the enlightened haven’t caught on yet. wink

    • Bilby says:

      01:48pm | 15/06/11

      St Mick - It’s a clever disguise don’t you think? People think that Flash is buggy because it slows your whole computer down and the OS has to kill it periodically. One day, when it becomes self aware, the OS will be powerless and Harquebus will be first against the wall. Personally I welcome our new lords and masters.

    • Ian says:

      11:29am | 15/06/11

      Scanlon’s obviously scared about machines being more intelligent than he is. No doubt he’d be the first to start shooting down androids that might be human-like.  The problem with Scanlon’s argument is that it’s like listening to people declaring that human flight is impossible; it’s impossible to fly to the moon; it’s impossible to travel under water etc etc.

      The key for computer scientists working in AI will be the day they are able to create emotional responses. It might not happen in the next decade but it will happen and probably sooner than later.

      Reply

    • MD says:

      12:14pm | 15/06/11

      I, for one, can’t wait for Deus Ex style augmentations and robots.

      Bring on the future.

      Reply

    • Troy says:

      12:36pm | 15/06/11

      The author is correct.  Computers will never, ever match the human mind because: why would they?  There has to be a reason.  They won’t grow and learn for the sake of it.  They need a reason.

      Our brains evolved over millions and millions of years, always with a purpose: survival.  Survival across a vaste spectrum of experience and circumstances.  As such, we developed incredible diversity and ability which we can draw upon to solve problems, create and think laterally etc.  This is the basis of intelligence.  For computers to develop such diverse ability they would need a reason to do so.  Who will give them this reason?  Who will programme a computer to get up and make itself a cup of tea?  Throw a ball?  Comb their hair?  Make a friend?

      No one will.  So computers will follow a relatively limited path of growth and learning, but never will they even come close to the range of human intelligence.  Never.

      Reply

    • fml says:

      02:48pm | 15/06/11

      “There has to be a reason.  They won’t grow and learn for the sake of it.  They need a reason.”

      The reason is someone programmed them to do so.

    • Troy says:

      03:07pm | 15/06/11

      @fml - “The reason is someone programmed them to do so”

      But, you see, that is my point.  We will only programme them to do very limited things and they will never go very far beyond that.  To achieve the greatness which some here think they will one day reach - something akin to the human mind - they’d need to take over this programming for themselves and develop it over and over and over again.  They would need to chase millions of irrelevant pathways, to cull what works and what doesn’t.  As I say, we did it over millions and millions of years in order to survive.  Our brains were shaped serving many thousands of species, living in a million different environments, all with this one rule to keep it going: survival.  That was our incentive.  What is theirs?

    • Markus says:

      03:08pm | 15/06/11

      I choose to believe what I was programmed to believe!

    • Bilby says:

      03:19pm | 15/06/11

      Troy - You clearly underestimate the propensity of engineers to do something just because they can.

      The making a cup of tea’s been done. The throwing (and catching) a ball has been done. Making a friend is harder, but people are working on it. As to combing their hair, you may be right, but then as soon as someone puts hair on a robot that needs combing, no doubt that will be solved to.

      Engineers… taking care of the important stuff.

    • fml says:

      04:22pm | 15/06/11

      Troy,

      Look up what an expert system is.
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expert_system

      Then, program a machine to search through the expert system for an answer. If the answer is found add question and conclusion to expert system for later.

      The conclusion is based on another expert system, or by observing the actions of others. Or the conclusion can be based on weights from a neural network or fuzzy system.

      “What is theirs?” Their incentive is our incentive to program them to learn.

    • Troy says:

      04:53pm | 15/06/11

      @fml - thanks for the link.  Very interesting, although too technical for my abilities.  Howeger, I did scroll down to the list of “disadvantages” and found this:

      “Expert systems are notoriously narrow in their domain of knowledge — as an amusing example, a researcher used the “skin disease” expert system to diagnose his rustbucket car as likely to have developed measles — and the systems are thus prone to making errors that humans would easily spot. Additionally, once some of the mystique had worn off, most programmers realized that simple expert systems were essentially just slightly more elaborate versions of the decision logic they had already been using. Therefore, some of the techniques of expert systems can now be found in most complex programs without drawing much recognition.”

      That’s what I’m talkin’ bout, baby!

    • Bitten says:

      12:45pm | 15/06/11

      Eh. Some mornings I swear my dog is smarter than I am. Doesn’t seem such a leap that a computer could beat me at all that hard thinking and doing stuff. Know your limitations people!

      Now, has anyone seen my keys?

      Reply

    • stephen says:

      05:14pm | 15/06/11

      I’d like to know who or what is gonns fix my ipod ?
      Another ipod ?
      Cause it’s playing up and not even the humans in Singapore, (the Apple techs) can help me.
      I’ve asked my Laptop, and it can’t do it.
      I’ve had a word to my mobile phone and seeing it’s a girl the only thing it wanted to do was slap me across the face.
      (I said ‘sex’ instead of ‘text’)
      My vacuum cleaner can’t help : it’s having trouble starting lately cause the stuff it was sucking up it did not even know how to expel naturally, ( and seeing as I run a ‘green’ house, a non-selfhelping vacuum is simply extraneous.
      I’ve concluded from all this that the reason why the ipod broke in the first place is cause it didn’t have a bloody clue what it was doing, in which case it’s only a figment of Mr. Wozniak’s imagination that it will someday be stupider that most of us, as we’re also, clue-less.

      Reply

    • DaveinPerth says:

      11:30pm | 15/06/11

      “Talk about precision-guided ‘smart bombs’ and unmanned drones washes over us, as if machines have magically minimised civilian deaths in war.”

      If the author thinks the current operational unmanned drones are an example of autonomous logic, then he is clearly not qualified to speak on the subject in public.

      Christopher. More reading and less yapping.

      Reply

    • Mario G. says:

      04:20am | 16/06/11

      I have to agree with this article. My career qualifications probably put me in the territory of professional “geekdom”, so I’m not just talking out of my arse.

      (I have worked with advanced computing concepts such as “genetic algorithms” and other “self-learning” technologies).

      Dear Eric: “heavier-than-air flight IS possible” only because we understand the physics behind it. Computing machines are appearing to get “smarter” simply because they can process computations quicker than humans. Until we can separate intelligence from “smarts”, we cannot produce an intelligent machine.

      The concept that “intelligence will just spring out of nowhere” is as silly as the belief, in the 1600’s, that maggots spontaneously came into being from rotting meat!

      Instead of a self-aware, autonomous, organic computer , the next logical step will be “mental prostheses”. In otherwords, electronic enhancements to our own brains. Our brains will still do the “thinking”, but these integrated devices will do computations and interfacing. Image signals, for example, can be directly fed into our optic nerves. We will be able to selectively switch on and off enhanced zoom vision, night vision and other senses: enhanced hearing, smell, memory, etc.

      The foundations for these inventions already exist.

      Reply

    • OnlyOneWayOut says:

      09:45am | 16/06/11

      And the benefits of human intelligence have been what? A continued acceptance and misplaced reliance on of a multitude of unprovable beliefs (i.e. religion), endless war, environmental vandalism and rape, the inability to accept the far-reaching effects of the concentration of power and wealth. The list goes on. Ah, but it’s alright. We wrote some nice songs, and painted some pretty pictures, and invented things that predominantly do more harm than good. Imagination is the source of possibility, but awareness is the key, and consideration the most effective but least utilized controller. In other words (and considering the vast majority of people on this planet), we’re doomed.

      Reply
 
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