Extensive Reading

Read the following text and prepare to discuss in class:

http://naturalsociety.com/scientists-create-computer-read-your-thoughts-put-into-words/



Read the following text and prepare to discuss in class:

Artificial Intelligence (AI)

Artificial intelligence 'could be the worst thing to happen to humanity': Stephen Hawking warns that rise of robots may be disastrous for mankind.

A sinister threat is brewing deep inside the technology laboratories of Silicon Valley.
Artificial Intelligence, disguised as helpful digital assistants and self-driving vehicles, is gaining a foothold – and it could one day spell the end for mankind.

This is according to Stephen Hawking who has warned that humanity faces an uncertain future as technology learns to think for itself and adapt to its environment.

In an article written in the Independent, the renowned physicist discusses Jonny Depp's latest film Transcendence, which delves into a world where computers can surpass the abilities of humans.

Professor Hawking said dismissing the film as science fiction could be the ‘worst mistake in history’.

He argues that developments in digital personal assistants Siri, Google Now and Cortana are merely symptoms of an IT arms race which ‘pale against what the coming decades will bring.’

But Professor Hawking notes that other potential benefits of this technology could also be significant, with the potential to eradicate war, disease and poverty.

‘Success in creating AI would be the biggest event in human history,’ he said. ‘Unfortunately, it might also be the last, unless we learn how to avoid the risks.’

In the short and medium-term, militaries throughout the world are working to develop autonomous weapon systems, with the UN simultaneously working to ban them,
‘Looking further ahead, there are no fundamental limits to what can be achieved,’ said Professor Hawking.

‘There is no physical law precluding particles from being organised in ways that perform even more advanced computations than the arrangements of particles in human brains.

In fact, IBM has already developed smart chips that could pave the way for sensor networks that mimic the brain’s capacity for perception, action, and thought.

One day, it could allow computer scientists to develop a machine with a brain that is even more intelligent than that of humans.

‘As Irving Good realised in 1965, machines with superhuman intelligence could repeatedly improve their design even further, triggering what Vernor Vinge called a singularity,’ said Professor Hawking.

Professor Hawking added experts are not prepared for these scenarios. Offering a comparison, he said that if aliens were to tell us they would arrive within a few decades, scientists would not just sit waiting for their arrival. 

‘Although we are facing potentially the best or worst thing to happen to humanity in history, little serious research is devoted to these issues.

‘All of us should ask ourselves what we can do now to improve the chances of reaping the benefits and avoiding the risks.’

Google has set up an ethics board to oversee its work in artificial intelligence. The search giant has recently bought several robotics companies, along with Deep Mind, a British firm creating software that tries to help computers think like humans.

One of its founders warned artificial intelligence is  'number 1 risk for this century,' and believes it could play a part in human extinction. 'Eventually, I think human extinction will probably occur, and technology will likely play a part in this,' DeepMind’s Shane Legg said in a recent interview.

Among all forms of technology that could wipe out the human species, he singled out artificial intelligence, or AI, as the 'number 1 risk for this century.'

Neuroscientist Demis Hassabis, 37, co-founded DeepMind Technologies just two years ago with the aim of trying to help computers think like humans.


Answer the following questions:

1. What is artificial intelligence? Please explain.
2. Who is Stephen Hawking? Why is his opinion important? What can you tell about him? Click here and also here, and read about Stephen Hawking. Prepare to speak.
3. What is Silicon Valley? Where is it located? 
4. What is Transcendence about?
5. What can you tell about Siri, Google Now and Cortana?
6. What does Professor Hawking mean when he claims that Siri, Google Now and Cortana are only symptoms of an IT arms race which ‘pale against what the coming decades will bring'?

7. What are the advantages and the disadvantages of AI? What are the risks? Why?

8. What is Google DeepMind?

Retrieved from Daily Mail:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2618434/Artificial-intelligence-worst-thing-happen-humanity-Stephen-Hawking-warns-rise-robots-disastrous-mankind.html

References

AI website: www.a-i.com

Daily Mail: www.dailymail.co.uk





Read and prepare to discuss the following text:

CAN ROBOTS GO BEYOND WHAT IS INITIALLY PERCEIVED AND HAVE MACHINE INTUITION?

The computer versus the human mind will always be a question on the forefront of the news. Ultimate goals for these that push the computer brain further and faster are to replace a human at a specific task. Those tasks will vary as time goes by, but there are always dangerous and tedious tasks that a programmer is trying to get a computer to do that a human simply hates doing.

What are the things that hold a computer back and can these limits be bested? Computer scientists at MIT are pushing the bounds of what a computer can do. An innate skill that humans have is to interpolate information that is not readily available in a situation.

Most of this comes from the subconscious making comparative analysis of a situation versus past situations that are similar. The problem is that computers do not like to choose among things that are “similar.”

A computer likes cold hard facts. However, a computer can think a little beyond that boundary and that small windows can be the saving grace that computer programmers need. At MIT, a computer was shown 8 million photos from Google with attached information on the demographics of the area around that photo. The specific demographics that were used included the location of McDonald’s restaurants and the crime rates in that area.

The computer was simply given the information and not helped in any way. This information was used by the computer to learn what objects and items in photos might indicate the crime rate in an area and the possible nearby McDonald’s location. The computer was then pitted against a human or set of humans in a contest of intuition.

Each was shown a series of new photos. These photos did not contain any demographics information, there were just pictures from Google Street View. The question was then asked as to which of the four possible directions would most likely contain a McDonald’s and questions about the viability that a given direction might have a lower or higher crime rate.

In this given test, the computer outperformed the humans nearly every time. Human intuition is one of the things that will make the human race powerful and at the top of the mental food chain. It is this ability to go beyond what is initially perceived that makes certain tasks possible for humans and not for machines. However, it is getting to the point where a computer just may be able to significantly help in many situations.

Imagine an automobile GPS that can steer a lost driver not only to a destination, but using a safer route. Imagine that same GPS finding a gas station for the driver based upon a visual analysis, rather than demographics alone. This could be the future.


That can even lead to a computer that can find cancer cells in a human without the need for a X-ray or MRI, based solely upon the likelihood of their location. This may seem farfetched, but these are things that are surely in the future.



Retrieved from:

https://wtvox.com/robotics/can-robots-go-beyond-and-have-machine-intuition