Sunday 20 May 2007

Views on AI

There are two major positions regarding the current and future artificial intelligence:

Weak AI Position
This hypothesis states that any machine program is at most only capable of simulating real human behavior and consciousness. Machines will not be able to think, but will be able to act intelligently, because there are things that computers cannot do, no matter how much effort we put into programming them. Given the complexity of thinking, writing such programs is impractical and is bound to fail
.
Supporters of Weak AI include Roger Penrose and John Searle who used his Chinese room parable to promote weak AI.

Strong AI Position
Strong AI theory claims that correctly written program running on a machine will not only act intelligently, but will be able to think, will have a conscious mind. There will be no real difference between a program emulating the actions of the brain, and the consciousness of a human being. Such a program will be able to truly reason and become self-aware, it will be a mind.
Although strong AI's dramatic reduction of consciousness into an algorithm is difficult for many to accept,
it does have its own supporters such as Douglas Hofstadter and Daniel Dennett.

Although current technology does not yet allow us to write such a program, a lot of work is being done in this field. As an example, consider a recent report by the BBC regarding an experiment simulating of a mouse brain (well, actually half of it)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/6600965.stm Research like this will eventually lead to an Artificial Intelligent machine that will be conscious and will be a mind.

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