Hans Moravec, adjunct faculty member at
the Robotics Institute of Carnegie Mellon University, pointed out
that machine technology mimicked a savant infant. Machines can do
long math equations instantly and beat humans in chess, but they
can't answer a simple question or walk up a flight of stairs (until
recently). He, along with many others has been working to solve that
paradox and help computers evolve on their own.
Early artificial intelligence (AI) researchers believed intelligence
was characterized as the things that highly educated scientists
found challenging, such as chess, symbolic integration, and solving
complicated word algebra problems. They thought, if those could be
done so easily by computers, things that children of four or five
years could do effortlessly, such as visually distinguishing between
a coffee cup and a chair, or walking around on two legs, or
responding to words would be infinitely easier for computers to
learn.
Computers/robots are finally beginning to move and think like
people. Narrative Science can write earnings summaries that are
indistinguishable from wire reports. We can ask our phones, 'I'm
lost, help.' and our phones can tell us how to get home. (The
smartphone was introduced in 2007, just seven years ago.)
Computers that can drive cars were never supposed to happen and ten
years ago, many engineers said it was impossible. Navigating a
crowded street requires a combination of spacial awareness, soft
focus, and constant anticipation. Yet, today we have Google's
self-driving cars and they have been approved by some states as
allowable on city streets. Ten years from impossible to common.
IBM, working with Memorial Sloan-Kettering cancer information is
using its computers to diagnose diseases and the Cleveland Clinic to
help train aspiring physicians. It just invested a billion dollars
to set up 'Watson' into a separate business unit for medical and
other complex decision making activities.
Bottom line, we are experiencing solutions to the paradox and it
is very exciting, although I am not sure machines will ever
replace the following or that we will ever want to.