The grey area of intelligence: Blurring the line between artificial and genuine intellect.

You’ve seen the films: 2001: A Space Odyssey, Bladerunner, Terminator, AI, Wall-E, and countless others. At a time when computer technology was in its infancy, it was exciting to think about the possibilities of robot intelligence and their relationships with humans. However, in the 21st century, amidst a vast expanse of computer engineering and learning technologies, integrative robots are rather common. They build our cars, build our computers, search for the closest burger joint, and even assess our online shopping habits. As engineers continue to push the limits of what computers and robots are capable of, could we, some day in the near future, find ourselves educating robots? Would educators be involved in the programming of AI to incorporate self-learning? What level of educational theory is integrated into designing these types of robots? Starting with a blank slate allows developers the flexibility to hyper-focus the “mind” of the robot on specific tasks without the learning differences between students or distractions humans encounter in everyday life. Being able to do this inherently cures many of the difficulties educators encounter when trying to teach others. Companies, such as OpenAI in Silicon Valley, are constantly working toward robot learning and communication.

“With early humans, language came from necessity. They learned to communicate because it helped them do other stuff, gave them an advantage over animals. These OpenAI researchers want to create the same dynamic for bots. In their virtual world, the bots not only learn their own language, they also use simple gestures and actions to communicate—pointing in particular direction, for instance, or actually guiding each other from place to place—much like babies do. That too is language, or at least a path to language.” (Wired, 2017.)

However, when will robots stop learning? Will they be programmed to learn only to improve upon specific tasks or will their curiosity be boundless? If they are connected to the internet, they could potentially never stop learning. Of course, each robot will be limited to its design; the amount of memory it can store, it’s functionality and articulation, and its battery power will presumably all be limiting factors in what a robot can actually accomplish. But is it no longer preposterous to ponder about a day when robots educate us?

“In the end, success will likely come from a combination of [learning and programming] techniques, not just one. And [researcher Igor] Mordatch is proposing yet another technique—one where bots don’t just learn to chat. They learn to chat in a language of their own making. As humans have shown, that is a powerful idea.” (Wired, 2017.)

I just hope Will Smith is still around to save us from the takeover.

References

https://www.wired.com/2017/03/openai-builds-bots-learn-speak-language/