Artificial Intelligence: Technological breakthrough or end of the world as we know it

So considering the fact that this is only my second blog post I have clearly chosen one of the most debated and controversial subject of the modern day. But what drove me to write about this is the fact that great people of our time like Bill Gates & Stephen Hawking are actually concerned about this and when they show concern you know something is really wrong. So let us start with the very basic question, what is Artificial Intelligence (AI)?

Well in simple words it is a computer that can make decisions, a computer with a mind of its own. Simple enough right? Not really, people who are experts in the field of AI today have a hard time explaining as to what AI actually is. When you consider things like self awareness, intuition, consciousness and abstract thinking. Now it is difficult to understand all this that is why the divided it into 3 categories of their own:

·        Weak AI

·        Strong AI

·        Artificial Super intelligence

Now I know some of you are thinking what the hell am I talking about? Let us take a step back and understand what each one of these mean.

Weak AI:

Now this type of AI is possible, in fact we use it every day. Apple’s SIRI or Google now on android are best examples of this. This AI merely simulates or imitates intelligence, at no point its creator claims that it is self aware or has a mind. Another example is an initiative by IBM where on a game show called ‘Jeopardy’ it’s Watson computer actually defeated human champions of the game. Same is the case with the chess masters; they have defeated world champions at chess.

Strong AI:

Strong AI is a theoretical computer system that actually has a mind like a human being. It does not simulate consciousness, it is self aware. Now here the best examples are sci-fi movies, when they talk about AI they are talking about this. The computer from The Matrix, Skynet from Terminator, even our very own chitti from Rajnikant’s movie robot is an example of strong AI. Now that’s what has ever body scared. It has the capability to make its own decisions that means it can do research in the field of AI and upgrade itself!

Artificial Super intelligence:

Now assuming we somehow manage to simulate a human mind and create a strong AI, if it grows and upgrade itself it will become far more superior to what a human can ever be. (I’d recommend watching a movie called Transcendence.) Nick Bostrom has written a book called ‘Super intelligence’ in which he states on how catastrophic will be rise of an ASI, which of course include something that is called a ‘Singularity’(a major event that will change the course of the human race) and also end of the world as we know it.

Reality Check:

You know as much as I would love a J.A.R.V.I.S. for myself, let’s just hold our horses for a minute. I love sci-fi but at the end of the day it is fiction. There are many great scientists who believe it is impossible to simulate a human mind. And the best argument made against this is something called ‘The Chinese room argument’. ‘ Imagine a person in a room who speaks no Chinese, in the room he has a rule book which tells him how to respond to messages in Chinese, the book does not translate it to his native language it just tells him how to form a reply on the basis of what is given. Outside the room a native Chinese speaker passes the messages from under the door, the man takes the messages, follows the rules and form a reply and slide it back outside. Now the man outside gets a reply in perfect Chinese so he thinks the man on the inside knows how to speak Chinese but the man on the inside does not speak Chinese, he does not understand the messages and he does not understand the reply he forms’. Apply this to the concept of AI and you understand that the machine actually never really understands anything we feed to it is simply following a certain set of rules.

Conclusion:

Well the world is divided on the subject but the argument that some scientists make that humans are more than just a biological machine with a brain is quite interesting, that there is something that humans have that a machine can never imitate, ‘Spirit’. Now emergence of weak AI well it’s quite possible and it should grow because it has limitless applications. And again as much as I would love a J.A.R.V.I.S. for myself, I would also like to be a genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist. So yeah!! Strong AI I would not bet my money on it.

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