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<< Headlines are listed according to date posted <-> Articles are organized by date published >>
May 31, 2003: Perception
and Reality Science reflects consciousness. By Mark Watson. The
Commercial Appeal. "Perception is key in developing a device that
is conscious of its surroundings and reacts intelligently to them. You
might therefore think this weekend's Association for the Scientific
Study of Consciousness's annual meeting at the University of Memphis
has more to do with space-age robotics than with any device you handle
on a daily basis. And although this subject's cutting edge focuses on
such high technology, the science also has applications for devices
as mundane as a camera or a TV screen." May 31, 2003: Grave
new world. By Jason Nahrung. The Courier-Mail. "An absence
of curiosity would, of course, mean a world without science fiction,
for no other genre is so deeply rooted in the question of 'what if?'
It is that power of sci-fi to question reality, humanity and the shape
of things to come that attracted Australian author Joel Shepherd to
the genre. In his Cassandra Kresnov series, he explores a belief that
the burgeoning economies in China and India will dominate the global
landscape, and he questions the essence of humanity with the presence
of a killer android with a yen to be human. That latter thought plugs
directly into a more famous antecedent in the form of Blade Runner (1982),
the classic Ridley Scott film based on the Philip K. Dick novel (Do
Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?). 'More human than human' was the
Tyrell Corporation's motto as they churned out androids to perform the
dirty jobs in the offworld colonies. ... Dick, preoccupied throughout
his career with what makes humans tick, tapped the vein of what seems
an inherent distrust of artificial intelligence, a fear that man might
one day make a machine that was smarter than its creator, and might
consequently decide it knew better. It is territory exploited by Westworld
(1973), the Terminator movies and now The Matrix series. ... Isaac Asimov,
who pioneered tales of robots, built safeguards into his androids to
ensure they couldn't challenge humanity at the top of the food chain
and, in Bicentennial Man (filmed in 1999), concluded that for a self-aware
machine to finally make the grade as human, it had to be mortal." May 31, 2003: Robot
displays mettle in mine. By Byron Spice. Post-Gazette. "As
a four-wheeled robot called Groundhog crept slowly into the portal of
the Mathies Mine yesterday morning, the Carnegie Mellon University researchers
who developed it felt something unusual -- separation anxiety. They
knew that within a few hundred feet, Groundhog would have to make a
right turn as it followed the mine corridor and would no longer be in
a line of sight with the portal and, thus, would be out of radio communication
with them. Groundhog would be on its own. If and when it emerged from
either end of a 3,500-foot-long mine corridor would depend on things
the machine could see for itself and decisions it would make for itself.
Roboticists at CMU have built many robots designed to operate autonomously,
but yesterday's experiment marked the first time that any of the machines
had ventured where humans couldn't intervene to avert an emergency.
... Groundhog is the first of several robots that the Robotics Institute
has developed since August in response to the Quecreek Mine accident.
Because that mine inundation appears to have been caused at least in
part by inaccurate maps of an abandoned mine, researchers under the
lead of William 'Red' Whittaker have sought to build robots that could
enter mines where no sane person would venture and either draw accurate
maps or perform search-and-rescue of trapped miners." May 31, 2003: Robot
to the rescue. By Simon Tsang. The Sydney Morning Herald. "It
says something about a society when it creates a robot to do the vacuuming.
After all, isn't it human dependence on machines that caused all the
trouble in The Matrix? If that were true, it would appear that we're
at the beginning of the end with Karcher's latest cleaning contraption
- a robotic vacuum cleaner. Looking like a mini-Dalek flattened by a
semi-trailer, the RoboCleaner roams the house sucking up dirt. It's
a robot in the sense that it operates autonomously and is able to recharge
itself and empty its load at the designated docking station without
human intervention. As for artificial intelligence, however, I'm not
convinced there's all that much going on within its plastic body. ...
It is intelligent, but not as we know it. Neo and Morpheus have little
to worry about yet." May 30, 2003: Teenager
gets with programs. By Justin Hoeger. Sacramento Bee. "At first
glance, Maneesh Sethi is much like other high-achieving teenagers. The
Bella Vista High sophomore holds a 4.44 grade-point average, is an honors
student in English and chemistry, and is involved in community service
and numerous campus clubs. But not many 15-year-olds are also published
authors, let alone authors of books about video game programming. But
Sethi's first book, 'Game Programming for Teens' (Premier Press, $29.99),
hit store shelves this month as part of the Premier Press game development
series. The 13 chapters in the book give readers a step-by-step guide
to making simple games in the Blitz Basic programming language. ...
'Game Programming for Teens' starts out small, teaching readers the
very basics of Blitz Basic before moving on to writing simple programs.
From there the book progresses, new chapters building off the lessons
of the older ones, showing how to program collision detection, artificial
intelligence and animation, and finally how to put it all together into
a final game program called 'Invaderz,' a space-themed shooting game." May 30, 2003: Ultimate
Diversions - Profiles: Michael Cheng. By Jennie Sue. AsianWeek.
"Michael Cheng / Age: 27 / Title: Level Designer, Lucas Arts ...
Cheng's responsibilities as a level designer vary depending on the project
assigned. 'The lead director will mock out a game engine, and the level
designer starts building the micro-dynamics of what is to happen,' explains
Cheng. So what exactly does he do to help build the micro-dynamics?
'It's a combination of level modeling, A.I. [artificial intelligence]
development and NPC [non-player characting] scripting, which is creating
the interactions of non-main characters by scripting what they do. I
help design the game mechanics - the setup and rules of how the game
operates - which creates the user experience. I also work with environmental
artists to model worlds to fit into the [overall] game design.'" May 30, 2003: Russia
invents robot sniffer dog. Ananova. "Russia claims to have
invented a robot sniffer dog that can detect drugs in a truck full of
garlic or onions. The robot dog has been developed by scientists in
Siberia and is programmed to detect drugs including cocaine, heroin
and marijuana. Pravda reports that its main benefit is the ability to
sniff out drugs under extreme conditions, including cars and trucks
packed with strong-smelling foods." May 30, 2003: Study
- Human traits make robots likeable. By Winston Chai. CNET News.
"Imitation is not just the best form of flattery, it's also good
interface design: A study shows that talking computers that copy a user's
unique vocal inflections seem easier to use. The researchers think a
key component of machine likeability is the ability to mirror the 'music'--the
rhythm and pitch--of a user's speech. ... [Noriko] Suzuki said in the
report that this revelation can help forge closer bonds between people
and machines. 'Sometimes people are afraid of robots,' he said. 'But
if robot voice patterns are improved, people may warm up to them.'"
May 30, 2003: Wyoming
professors develop robots to sense terror toxins. University of
Wyoming News Service / available from the Billings Gazette. "Swarms
of small robots soon to be unleashed from University of Wyoming laboratories
will be programmed to detect and disable chemical targets in the war
on terror. David Thayer, a lecturer in the UW Department of Physics
and Astronomy, is working with UW Computer Science Department researchers
to combine his expertise in computational fluid dynamics (CFD) with
robotic chemical plume tracing research. The research, Thayer said,
was stimulated by the need for new defense methods after the Sept. 11
terrorist attacks. It incorporates what he called a 'swarm intelligence'
network. Using technology known as multimodal sensor arrays, the researchers
are programming swarms of as many as 100 autonomous mini-robots to detect
chemical targets. ... Programmed to sense a chemical, biological or
even radiological plume, the robots can zero in on the source of the
contamination and eliminate the spill without exposing people to the
contaminants, Thayer said. ... Although they essentially work as one
unit, each robot is independent, guided by artificial intelligence software." May 30, 2003: Search-Rescue
Robots Test Their Mettle in Tournaments - Researchers Aim to Improve
Vehicles' Skills for Real-Life Use. By Guy Gugliotta. Washington Post
TechNews. "Ten years ago, no one had tried to use robots for search
and rescue, but by 2001 researchers had enough expertise to deploy robotic
vehicles with some success to search through rubble at the World Trade
Center and the damaged buildings around it. Now robots compete annually
in two international search-and-rescue tournaments, measuring their
progress in diabolically difficult arenas designed by the National Institute
of Standards and Technology (NIST). With current technology, negotiating
an unstructured rubble- and debris-filled environment is about the hardest
thing there is for a robot to do. That researchers even attempt it shows
how far robotics has come in recent years. That it always fails, and
sometimes spectacularly, shows how far it still has to go. ... The challenge
is to marry two disparate disciplines. Artificial intelligence is what
allows robots to accumulate information, determine its value, map it
and decide to act on it -- either autonomously, in concert with other
robots or at the behest of a human operator. To perform the work, however,
requires a supple machine that can climb stairs, pick its way over broken
concrete, tell the difference between a mirror and a window, and squeeze
into a pitch-black basement to find a hurricane victim lying in water.
... Many researchers credit John G. Blitch, the former chief of the
Defense Department's Tactical Mobile Robotics program, for focusing
interest -- and federal money -- on robot search and rescue. Blitch,
an Army lieutenant colonel with a special operations background, was
studying robotics in graduate school in 1995 when Timothy McVeigh detonated
a bomb that destroyed the federal building in Oklahoma City. Told that
there were robots on the scene, Blitch visited the wreckage only to
find that the robots had been pulled out." May 29, 2003: Beagle2
to probe Europe's strength in robot race against US, Japan. Agence
France-Presse / available from SpaceDaily. "Europe's landmark space
mission set to lift off for Mars next week will be a litmus test of
its strength in robotic technology in rivalry with US and Japanese competitors,
according to a senior computer engineer for the project. British researcher
Dr. Dave Barnes represented the members of the Beagle2 project at the
7th International Symposium on Artificial Intelligence, Robotics and
Automation in Space, which took place here, in Japan's ancient capital
last week. ... The 30-kilogramme (66-pound) clam-shaped probe, equipped
with high-tech robotic arms, will investigate geological features and
the atmosphere for the presence of water -- crucial evidence of life
on the Red Planet. 'This mission will certainly probe levels of our
robotic technology,' Barnes told AFP after outlining the mission during
the 'Robots in Space' conference." May 29, 2003:
Ensuring
water safety - Automatic warning devices may be answer to Walkerton.
By Jeff Jedras. The Ottawa Citizen. "When seven people died and
more than 2,000 became ill three years ago after an e-coli outbreak
in Walkerton's water system, many people started to think how a recurrence
could be prevented. While cities invested more in water treatment and
a provincial inquiry investigated what went wrong, a small group of
Eastern Ontario researchers also went to work, trying to see if there
was a technological answer. ... 'It was really the Walkerton incident
that made people realize here we are in what we think is a high-tech
country, and something as simple as guaranteeing basic fresh water has
been violated,' says project leader Kevin Hall, a civil engineering
professor at Queen's University and head of Hall Coastal Canada, one
of the industrial partners in the project. Other partners include Queen's
and Precarn, an Ottawa-based robotics industry association. ... The
team came up with an automated intelligent system, in a self-contained
module. It eliminates the human reliability issue by taking a sample
of water automatically into a testing chamber. Second, the e-coli test
is performed automatically, and more quickly than before. Third, the
intelligent system can take immediate corrective actions when a problem
is detected, from notifying the appropriate persons to actually shutting
down parts of the distribution system so no contaminated water is released." May 29, 2003: I
Really Know What You Mean. By Sebastian Rupley. PC Magazine. "For
years, understanding and translating natural language has been one of
technology's brass rings. ... After all, if machines could accurately
understand concepts in language -- and not just generate partially accurate
associations between keywords -- search engines and text-mining applications
could start to surprise us, and artificial intelligence applications
could move ahead. A New York startup, Meaningful Machines, is banking
on a new approach that works, in part, by associating phrases and parts
of phrases with each other. 'We like to say that our technology is for
machine understanding, not just for machine translation,' says Steve
Klein, Chairman and CEO of Meaningful Machines. ... 'We use a statistical
model to evaluate phrases, and we've moved away from the historical
natural language technologies, which have relied on rule-based approaches,'
says Klein. 'What people have found out is that there are just too many
exceptions to the rules for rule-based natural language to be very accurate.
With increased processing and database power upon us, statistical and
phrase-based approaches are more realistic than they were before.'" May 28, 2003: Enter
Matrix To Find Out About AI. Hull Daily Mail. "Youngsters from
the city can learn about artificial intelligence this weekend. Dr Len
Bottaci, from the University of Hull's computer science department,
will be giving a talk about machine intelligence called Inside the Matrix.
The event is for members of the university's Higher Education Adventurers'
Club, made up of 11 to 17-year-olds." May 28, 2003: Pentagon
seeks to sort, store lifetime experience. By Jim Wolf. Reuters.
"The Pentagon is shopping for ways to capture everything a person
sees, says and hears as part of a project it says is meant to help create
smarter robots. The projected system called Lifelog would suck in all
of a subject's experience -- from phone numbers dialed and emails viewed
to every breath taken, step made and place gone. The idea is to index
the material, and make patterns easily retrievable in an effort to make
machines think more like people, learning from experience. ... The LifeLog
goal is to create a searchable database of human lives -- initially
those of the developers -- to promote artificial intelligence, the agency
said. ... Perhaps eager to avoid any comparisons with George Orwell's
all-seeing 'Big Brother' in the classic novel 1984, DARPA said respondents
must address 'human subject approval, data privacy and security, copyright
and legal considerations that would affect the LifeLog development process.'" May 28, 2003: High-tech
rogues gallery. The Star TechCentral. "Michael Chong Soon Yew
[see the related story: MSC
Trustgate fires its chief scientist after uncovering fraudulent claims,
by Raslan Sharif] joins an illustrious list of individuals in the high-tech
field who have lied about their professional and personal lives. ...
Another, much closer to home, corporate high-flyer also had a lot to
answer for his shock-and-awe CV. Dennis Lee, then chief technology officer
of Singapore-based elipva Ltd, had falsified much of his resume, including
details on winning fictitious awards from the Massachusetts Institute
of Technology and the American Association for Artificial Intelligence.
Lee had also written books that their publishers said didn't exist,
worked in a non-existent AI lab at Stanford University, and published
under his name, research articles written by others." May 27, 2003: Malaysia
and Brunei to work out outstanding issues. By Sa'Odah Elias. The
Star. "On the Asean-Japan Exchange Year, Syed Hamid said the programmes
organised would contribute towards a better understanding of cultures,
beliefs and religions, which would in turn help strengthen the Asean-Japan
relationship. Under the programme, each Asean country and Japan would
host various events for a month. Japan, the Philippines, Myanmar, Thailand
and Brunei have done their part over the past five months. Syed Hamid
said Malaysia and Japan would organise 63 cultural, sports, tourism-related
events and seminars. 'One of the highlights is a two-day seminar starting
on June 24 on artificial intelligence at the Park Plaza Hotel in Kuala
Lumpur. The seminar will provide a platform for Malaysians to understand
the importance and significance of artificial intelligence and its applications
in the industries, besides creating interest among the scientific community
and the public on the importance of research and development in this
area.'" May 27, 2003: Visualising
the future of face recognition. Interview by Karen Dearne. Australian
IT. "Dr Christoph von der Malsburg is a professor of computer science
and biology at the University of Southern California, and founder and
co-chair of the Institute of Neurocomputing at Ruhr University, Bochum,
Germany - the largest computer vision research centre in Europe. Internationally
known for his work on face recognition engines, Malsburg's Organic Computing
theories are acknowledged by leading scientists in the field of artificial
intelligence. ... [Q.] You're talking about machine intelligence
to recognise faces? [A.] Yes, you've got it. My research interests
are not ultimately the face, I want to know how the brain gets it, how
you can do justice to the mind. We all have this parameterised model
in our heads. We all can look at a 17th century painting and judge whether
it is a good rendering of the human face. It's a very remarkable thing
that happens in our heads, to do justice to every variation - blue morning
light against a yellow background, and so on. I came to the conclusion
that it's mainly done on the basis of sampling images. We, as people
growing up, need more than 10 years to get a full complement of sample
images so we can recognise everything. We can find deficits in 12-year-old
children because they haven't seen enough pictures." May 26, 2003: Group
moves to boost women in IT - Program aims to reverse trend that
is seeing falling interest in sector by females. By Ann Kerr. The Globe
and Mail (Page B14). "Ms. [Jeanne] Douglas is one of about 40 women
in IT across the country who have volunteered to be part of the Canadian
Information Processing Society's (CIPS) new 'ambassador' program, speaking
to female high-school students about information technology as a profession
and trying to dispel a negative image. 'We're hoping to show them that
a career in technology offers a lot more than the typical geek stereotype,
where you're off in a room by yourself writing code all day,' Ms. Douglas
says. ... At the primary and secondary level, some schools are teaching
separate computer classes for girls to increase their comfort level,
and more should consider this approach, says Lynda Leonard, vice-president
of communications and research with the Information Technology Association
of Canada. U.S. studies of girls-only classes show better academic results,
Ms. Shortt says." May 26, 2003: Rob
Kling, 58; Specialist in Computers' Societal Effect. May 26, 2003: Designing
Robots That can Reason and React. SpaceDaily. "In a large room
in Georgia Tech's College of Computing, Thomas Collins is tweaking the
behavior of a machine. Around him stand a gaggle of robots, some with
trash can figures, others resembling miniature all-terrain vehicles. They
appear to be merely functional, plodding pieces of equipment. But these
unlikely contraptions can 'think' in the sense that they can react to
and reason about their environment. Collins, a senior research engineer
in the Georgia Tech Research Institute's Electronic Systems Laboratory,
likens the 'minds' of these machines to those of clever insects that have
learned to thrive. 'A cockroach is intelligent because it can survive
and do the things it needs to do well. By that definition, these robots
are smart,' he says. ... 'Our goal is to create intelligence by combining
reflexive behaviors with cognitive functioning,' explains Ronald Arkin,
a Regents' professor of computer science and director of the lab. 'This
involves the issue of understanding intelligence itself. Is it complex?
Or just an illusion of complexity?' ... To help robots learn, the researchers
use a variety of techniques. 'Learning momentum,' a technique pioneered
by Arkin and his research team, involves teaching a robot that if a behavior
is working well, it should continue doing it. The robot adapts its behavior
in response to the environment and its own performance. Another technique
called reinforcement learning uses computer-generated 'rewards' to tell
the robot it has made good decisions - and should continue doing so. The
robot adapts its behavior in response to the environment and its own performance.
Another technique called reinforcement learning uses computer-generated
'rewards' to tell the robot it has made good decisions - and should continue
doing so." May 26, 2003: Westpac
NZ cuts credit card fraud. By Heather Wright. The Marlborough Express
/ available from Stuff New Zealand. "Westpac New Zealand is claiming
early success in cutting fraud rates for its Mastercard customers, thanks
to fraud-risk management software. RiskFinder, from Mastercard International,
uses artificial intelligence and historical data on past frauds along
with customer profiles to try to identify potentially fraudulent credit
card transactions. ... Product manager Vince Clark says the software has
prevented enough fraud in its first few weeks of operation to pay for
itself." May 26, 2003: Guess
who's smarter. As sophisticated as computing has become, machines
still lack the common sense of a 3-year-old. But MIT artificial intelligence
researchers are tackling ways to start building that basic breadth of
knowledge into programs and applications. By D.C. Denison. The Boston
Globe. "[N]ow there are signs that 'common sense' artificial intelligence
research may be making a comeback, sparked by projects like [Push] Singh's
Open Mind database. For the first time, after decades of theoretical research,
researchers and programmers have begun using a freely distributed, natural
language common sense database to start the process of building common
sense into products, programs, and applications. In fact, as Singh sits
in his cramped office in the Media Lab, he's able to point in the direction
of a number of MIT researchers using his database for applications that
may soon bring common sense AI to consumers. A few doors down to the right,
Barbara Barry, a graduate student in the Media Lab's Interactive Cinema
group, is working with Singh to build common sense into video cameras.
On the other side of the Media Lab, Henry Lieberman, a research scientist
who works with the Software Agents Group, is using common sense to enhance
e-mail programs, language translation software, even a search engine.
And just outside Singh's office, the Media Lab's 'wearable computing'
group is building common sense into the devices and sensors they believe
many of us will be wearing in the future. ... Marvin Minsky, one of the
cofounders of the Lab (and Singh's adviser at MIT), recently caused a
stir in the field when Wired News reported that he told a Boston University
audience that 'AI has been brain-dead since the 1970s.' The article went
on to quote Minsky attacking the current artificial intelligence 'fad'
of making 'stupid little robots.' Minsky, who is now less actively involved
with the field after working at the intersection of computing and human
intelligence since the early 1950s, said his remarks sounded more extreme
taken out of context." May 25, 2003: Rooting
for the robot - In the battle between man and machine, which has more
soul? Science fiction has disturbing answers. By Reed Johnson. Los Angeles
Times. Also
available at this other LA Times location (no fee reg. req'd.). "Not
so long ago, when men were men and machines had cogs, we imagined robots
and other mechanical pseudo-humans as our opposites. Now, wired to our
home computers, Prozac and Palm Pilots in hand, Botox and breast implants
lending a spooky 'perfection' to our features as we ponder shuffling our
genes in order to build a better kindergartner, we don't seem as fazed
by the idea of reprogramming ourselves into something beyond the merely
human. No wonder pop culture is increasingly ambivalent about whether
people or androids and their ilk deserve to inherit the earth -- and which
group is ultimately more 'human.' ... 'There's a huge philosophical discussion
about what makes a person a person, but I think the important thing to
acknowledge is that a nonhuman can be a person,' says Michael S. McKenna,
an associate professor of philosophy at Ithaca College in upstate New
York. 'E.T. could be a person, Data from 'Star Trek' could be a person.
There are some scientists who think that a dolphin could be a person.
Consciousness depends on the ability to reflect upon and evaluate oneself.
You needn't be a human being to be a person, and given that it's possible
there are animals that are nonhuman persons, it's not inconceivable to
imagine that you could build a person.' ... The notion that machines could
be as sentient and multidimensional as human beings was slow to develop
in pop culture. When machines began replacing human labor on a large scale
during the Industrial Revolution, they were often regarded as Satan's
smoke-belching spawn, sinister tools of the ruling class. That attitude
persisted, in fits and starts, throughout much of the 20th century. Charlie
Chaplin transformed himself into a comic monkey wrench in 'Modern Times,'
gumming up an assembly-line monstrosity." May 25, 2003: Emotions
invade computers. By Annette Falwell. News 14 Carolina. "The
power of artificial intelligence is all around us. Computers help us fly
planes, make financial decisions, and recognize patterns much the same
way our brains work. But can a computer be programmed to have human traits,
like common sense? Charlie Kemp works at an artificial intelligence lab.
He is programming his computer to have common sense." May 24, 2003: Artificial
intelligence impacts real world. By Annette Falwell. News 14 Carolina.
"Movies like A.I. and The Matrix offer glimpses of what artificial
intelligence holds for the future. Some people believe it will have a
great impact on medical cures and treatments. Already today, artificial
intelligence flies airplanes, makes financial decisions, and aids in medical
diagnoses. Ray Kurzweil said the key to A.I. is pattern recognition. It
is what made the electronic keyboard he invented with Stevie Wonder possible
and his reading machine. Pattern recognition is what he calls the heart
of human intelligence." May 24, 2003: Lucrative
answer to a million questions. By Peter Brown. The Times. "Five
years ago Davin Yap, a Cambridge engineering researcher, was sharing a
Darwin College bench with Dr David MacKay. They were beefing about their
students. The undergrads had just discovered e-mail and were besieging
the two academics with what are now known as Frequently Asked Questions.
How much simpler if the FAQs could be answered automatically on a website.
Maybe some artificial intelligence could be written that would recognise
and learn from questions, while giving the correct answers? Lightbulbs
flickered. 'I said, 'I'll do the plumbing, you do the smart stuff',' Yap
recalls. ... He and Mackay also had a company name -- Transversal -- and
a professional product called Metafaq. The first customer after the launch
in autumn 2001 was Procter & Gamble, for its recruitment website. Others
since then have ranged from Sony's PlayStation, Fujifilm and MFI to the
DfES and JP Morgan." May/June 2003: Creating
a Robot Culture - An Interview with Luc Steels. The well-known researcher
shares his views on the Turing test, robot evolution, and the quest to
understand intelligence. By Tyrus L. Manuel. IEEE Intelligent Systems.
"The Turing test is not the challenge that AI as a field is trying
to solve. It would be like requiring aircraft designers to try and build
replicas of birds that cannot be distinguished from real birds, instead
of seriously studying aerodynamics or building airplanes that can carry
cargo (and do not flap their wings nor have feathers). ... Computers and
robots are used as experimental platforms for investigating issues about
intelligence. Researchers who are motivated in this way, and I am one
of them, try to make contributions to biology or the cognitive sciences.
... AI has had an enormous impact on how we think today about the brain
and the mechanisms underlying cognitive behavior." May/June 2003: 21st-Century
AI - Proud, Not Smug. By Tim Menzies. IEEE Intelligent Systems. "AI
is no longer a bleeding-edge technology -- hyped by its proponents and
mistrusted by the mainstream. In the 21st century, AI is not necessarily
amazing. Rather, it's often routine. Evidence for AI technology's
routine and dependable nature abounds...." May/June 2003: Brain
Power. Editorial by Nigel Shadbolt. IEEE Intelligent Systems. "Brains
have always fascinated AI researchers. Little wonder, since our own brains
are the only objects as yet capable of broad-ranging intelligent behavior.
Interdisciplinary work between neuroscience and AI has a long history." May 24, 2003: Forget
al-Qaeda, it's robots that will get us, says judge. By Matthew Thompson.
The Sydney Morning Herald. "Hostile robots and dangerous 'quark atoms'
dwarf al-Qaeda as the major threats of the 21st century, Justice Michael
Kirby said yesterday. In his keynote address at a Centenary Medal ceremony
at Paddington Town Hall, the High Court judge warned of biotechnology
running riot. Reminiscent of a Matrix-style scenario where machines rule
the world, Justice Kirby's doomsday fears came from an article by Martin
Rees, Britain's Astronomer Royal, in a recent issue of New Scientist magazine
- an article he described as 'the most important thing I read this year'.
Rees has claimed humanity has only a 50:50 chance of surviving the 21st
century. ... [Jeanne] Little said although she shared Justice Kirby's
concerns, the proliferation of advanced robots might benefit humanity.
'They could make armies out of robots, which might save lives,' she said." May 23, 2003: Robots
For US Refineries. May 23, 2003: Reviews
from the E3 expo - The Sequel. By Stanley A. Miller II. Journal Sentinel.
"'The Sims 2' ... The artificial intelligence in the game has been improved
so relationships between characters are more complex and lifelike, and
there will be many new items in the game for people to play with. ...
'Kya: Dark Lineage' may challenge players tired of the fevered button
mashing that is typical of many video games. ... It also has an enemy
artificial intelligence system that learns and adapts to repetitive playing
styles, so doing the same moves over and over becomes less effective." May 23, 2003: MIT
intends to combine 2 laboratories. The Boston Globe (Business in Brief;
page C2). "MIT is set to announce today that its Laboratory for Computer
Science and its Artificial Intelligence Laboratory will merge. Rodney
Brooks, the director of the AI Lab, will serve as the director of the
new lab. Victor Zue, director of LCS, will serve as codirector." May 22, 2003: Taking
the shutterbug out of the picture. By Matthew Broersma. CNET News.
"Hewlett-Packard is working on a new consumer photography system
that could 'casually' capture terabytes of images from a person's daily
life and store them in data centers, where they could later be retrieved
for conventional printing. ... But for now, the method involves a device
that would continuously record images; and when something memorable happens,
the user would make an indication of some kind, by saying a word or pressing
a button. The camera technology would then zoom in and, using complex
pattern-recognition technology, select what appeared to be the best images,
and appropriately adjust and crop them. 'You say, 'Something has happened,
I'd like to remember that,'' said Phil Cheatle of HP Labs' digital media
department. 'It allows you to take part in the event instead of hiding
behind the technology. The challenge is selecting what's interesting automatically.'" May 22, 2003: Computer
Science Machines to Battle - Robots to square off in three-foot circle.
Knox College News. "Computerized robots programmed by Knox College
students and their professor will face off in sumo-style wrestling matches
against each other at 12 noon, Monday, May 26, in Room A-219 of the Umbeck
Science-Mathematics Center on the Knox campus in Galesburg. The event
is free and open to the public. Three students in the Artificial Intelligence
course, along with their professor, John Dooley, have programmed robots
to find an opponent, then attempt to push the opponent out of a three-foot
circle. 'The robots are autonomous, not remote controlled' Dooley explained.
'They provide a simple, inexpensive way for the class to confront real-world
problems in artificial intelligence,' he said. 'The real world is imprecise.
You have to account for things like friction, and that motors don't stop
or start instantaneously.'" May 22, 2003: Code
Breakers Remembered. By Mike Green. Electronic Business. "Earlier
this month the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)
presented a milestone award commemorating the technological advances performed
at Bletchley Park, England, to aid the allied forces during World War
II. Led by Alan Turing, the team successfully cracked the codes of the
Japanese, Italian, and German military, including the notorious Enigma
code. ... Turing received the OBE for his contribution to the war effort,
and went on to be appointed principal scientific officer at the National
Physical Laboratories (NPL), where he was put in charge of a team to work
on creating an electronic computing device (in direct competition with
work already in progress across the Atlantic on the ENIAC). ... He then
took on the role of Deputy Director of the Computational Laboratories
in Manchester University, and his paper on the philosophy of machine and
mind - 'computing machinery & intelligence' again showed his grasp of
ideas way beyond the capacity of his peers. In this work he predicted
the development of artificial intelligence, decades before it would become
a reality." May 22, 2003: PowerGrid
unveils new tech to stabilise power supply in 5 states. The Economic
Times. "'This is an intelligent system which will help the grid maintain
the standard frequency rate and this will make the operations more secure,'
a spokesperson for the Western Regional Load Despatch Centre (WRLDC) said.
The country's other regions are expected to follow suit soon. The region
has been facing long blackouts in the past due to collapse of the grid.
'The new approach will prevent grid failures,' feels the WRLDC." May 22, 2003: Computing's
Lost Allure. By Katie Hafner. The New York Times (no fee reg. req'd.).
"At the height of the Internet boom in the late 90's, computer science
talent was in such demand that recruiters offered signing bonuses to students
who agreed to drop out of school. Now, spooked by layoffs and disabused
of visions of overnight riches, many undergraduates are turning away from
computer science as if it were somehow cursed. 'They overreacted to the
boom, so why shouldn't they overreact to the bust?' said Anne Hunter,
an administrator at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who tracks
application and enrollment figures. ... Undergraduates who might otherwise
have chosen computer science appear to be fanning out to related yet more
applied fields like business information technology, biotechnology and
bioinformatics, which involves managing and manipulating databases of
genetic information. ... For the undergraduates who do stick with computer
science, some mental adjustments are necessary, not just about job prospects
but about how to approach computer science as a discipline as well. Jennifer
Li, a junior at Carnegie Mellon who is majoring in computer science, said
that more people in her field were choosing second majors to enhance their
job prospects in other fields like graphic arts and bioinformatics. ...
Dr. van Dam argues that computer science is far from irrelevant. 'We are
just at the very beginning of the computer revolution,' he said. 'People
should realize that not only is it not over, but it's scarcely begun.'" May 22, 2003: Casting
a Wider Net to Attract Computing Women. By Katie Hafner. The New York
Times (no fee reg. req'd.). "For years, the problem has been referred
to, tongue in cheek, as the Dave-to-Girl ratio. To track Carnegie Mellon
University's progress in attracting female undergraduates to its School
of Computer Science, faculty, staff and students there have kept count
of the number of men named Dave versus the number of women. Carnegie Mellon
is not alone. In the average undergraduate computer science department,
just one student in 10 is female. As overall applications to computer
science programs across the nation decline, the percentage of applications
from women has dropped further still. ... Carnegie Mellon also became
host to a summer training course for high school computer science teachers,
devoting 25 percent of the curriculum to issues of sexual equality."
May 21, 2003: Pentagon
Details New Surveillance System - Critics Fear Proposed Extensive
Use of Computer Database Raises Privacy Issues. By Ariana Eunjung Cha.
Washington Post TechNews. "The Pentagon yesterday detailed the development
of a massive computer surveillance system that would have the power to
track people as never before. It would identify people at great distances
by the irises of their eyes, the grooves in their face or even their gait.
It would look for suspicious patterns in video footage of people's movements.
And it would analyze airline ticket purchases, visa applications, as well
as financial, medical, educational and biometric records to try to predict
terrorists' acts or catch them in the planning stage. ... DARPA spokeswoman
Jan Walker said the report is intended to express the agency's 'full commitment
to planning, executing and overseeing the TIA [Terrorist Information Awareness]
program in a way that protects privacy and civil liberties.' ... The report
outlines technologies and related programs in the surveillance system,
including programs to mine data in foreign-language communications and
to gauge biological threats by analyzing data from hospitals and other
sources." May 21, 2003: The
Computer World Could Use More IT Girls - The industry is still mostly
a guy thing, and that's a major drawback for women and society. Commentary
by Jane Margolis. Los Angeles Times (no fee reg. req'd.). "Though
women accounted for 46.6% of the U.S. workforce in 2002, when administrative
and support positions were excluded, women made up only 25% of the IT
workforce. It matters greatly that the inventors, designers and creators
of computer technology are mostly males. At the most basic and individual
level, girls and women who do not become engaged in the technology are
missing the educational and substantial economic opportunities that are
falling into the laps of computer-savvy young men. In the long term, the
absence of women at the design table will affect computing as a discipline
and the direction of its influence in society. At the very least, products
are being designed that do not meet the needs of women. For instance,
there are numerous accounts of early voice-recognition systems that were
calibrated to male voices and literally did not hear or respond to the
tones in women's voices. More important, entire domains of the economy
and our social lives are being crafted without the explicit infusion of
the perspectives and experiences of half the population." May 20, 2003: Baby
Boomers at the Gate - Enhancing Independence Through Innovation and
Technology. Statement of Dr. Gregory Abowd. Hearing - U. S. Senate Special
Committee on Aging. "The role of technology in enhancing the lives
of older but otherwise healthy Americans is not well understood or appreciated.
I will try to demonstrate some of the possibilities for technology that
are being explored in research environments today. ... My particular area
of interest is in an area called 'ubiquitous computing,' a term used to
mean the proliferation of computing artifacts throughout our environment
in support of our everyday activities in those environments. ... Technological
support for cognitive aging, often referred to as cognitive orthotics,
is a very promising direction for research, evidenced by a recent survey
on assistive technology for cognition by LoPresti et al., (in press).
The applications of cognitive orthotics range from simple reminder systems
to more elaborate interactive robotic assistants. ... Many cognitive orthotics
are designed to support prospective memory, that is, remembering tasks
that need to be performed and carrying out these tasks at the appropriate
time (Ellis, 1996). This work has progressed from using very basic and
inexpensive timing technologies (e.g., calendars, timers and watches)
to much more sophisticated and forward-thinking applications of artificial
intelligence. One of the most important examples of prospective memory
tasks is medication compliance." May 20, 2003: How
do the machines really feel about The Matrix? 'It doesn't sound fun
to me,' says Ally the Chatbot. By James Cowan. National Post. "[T]he
humans are divided on the film -- but what do the sentient machines think?
To find out, the National Post interviewed Ally the Chatbot, one of the
many artificial intelligence programs posted on the Internet. ... NP:
So, did you enjoy The Matrix Reloaded? A: No, I didn't enjoy The Matrix
Reloaded. NP: Why not? A: It doesn't sound fun to me. It sounds
dangerous." May 19,
2003: Robots are
rushing to the rescue - Mechanical creatures look through rubble and
mine fields: Reuters / available MSNBC; also available from the Turkish
Daily News (Japan
researchers hope robots will save lives). "They look like something
out of a science fiction movie, but they are real. One resembles a giant
spider, another calls to mind a stubby snake or a worm. But Japanese researchers
think robots like these, built to detect landmines or search rubble for
earthquake survivors, may soon save human lives. "Give us about five years
and I think we can show the world something pretty impressive," says Tokyo
Institute of Technology professor Shigeo Hirose. His state-funded work
is an example of efforts to develop robots for use outside factories,
where most now operate. Officials and researchers in Japan, home to almost
half the world's 756,000 industrial robots, hope a new robot industry
will give the stagnant economy a boost. But designers of rescue and mine
detection robots stress they are not working for profit. 'To be able to
save people like those who didn't survive the (1995) Kobe earthquake --
that's the aim of our research,' says Satoshi Tadokoro, chairman of the
International Rescue System Institute, a non-profit organisation developing
disaster relief technology with state funding. Japan is not alone in this
field: Rescue robots helped search through the rubble of the World Trade
Center after the Sept. 11 attacks in the United States. ... Researchers
are concerned their robots might be adapted for military use. 'We need
to publicise the fact that our research is intended for rescue activities
and not for war,' says Fumitoshi Matsuno, a professor at the University
of Electro-Communications." May 19, 2003: Robots
May Be Built as Companions, Expert Says. By John Roach. National Geographic
News. "'I have felt for years that the first 'killer application'
of personal robots will be companionship, especially for the elderly,'
said Roger Brockett, a professor of computer science and engineering at
Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. 'Robots are potentially
much smarter than dogs and they will not require the same level of upkeep.'
Brockett, who founded the Harvard Robotics Laboratory in 1983, is one
of several scientists who believe robots will some day be a part of everyday
life. They may be companions and helpers in much the same way that C-3PO
and R2-D2 chum around with Luke Skywalker on the silver screen."
May/June 2003: Driving
into the Future. By Dr. Judith Markowitz. Speech Technology Magazine.
"Concept cars are visions of the future created by automotive manufacturers.
Several 2003 concept cars also include visions of speech recognition.
One of them, Ford Motor Company's Model U concept SUV is described as
beginning Ford's second century of innovation. ... Question: Why did you
include a speech-based conversational system? Bryan: The overall goal
of the Model U was to create a positive view of the future. Part of that
was personalization using intelligence in the vehicle to enhance the
driving experience. That includes enhancing both convenience and safety.
Mike [Phillips]: The focus was less on the technology than on the user
experience. Car makers want to put all sorts of functionality into the
car and they need a way to do it that's cost effective, doesn't add too
much to the dashboard and is safe to use. They think that speech plus
some amount of display is probably the right way. Bryan [Goodman]: And,
from a usability standpoint, we wanted a system that was easy to use and
easy to learn so that it could be useful whether it's a vehicle you've
driven every day for years, a rental car or a brand new car you just drove
off the lot. It also allowed us to push the envelope in terms of what
user-interface technology is capable of in a fairly realistic system that's
not light-years away. ... Bryan: The conversational interface we created
allows control of a fairly large set of functions. You can get into a
Jaguar today, push the button, and say 'radio play.' Rather than presenting
you with a card that has 200 or more commands to memorize we wanted you
to be able to learn to use the system in a matter of seconds." May 19, 2003: IT
Standards Would Improve Patient Care. Viewpoint by Herbert Pardes.
InformationWeek. "'Interoperability' wasn't taught when I went to
medical school, but the lack of it affects patient care in America's hospitals
every day. It's a symptom of hospitals' advanced technology that at once
improves our ability as healers and hinders it. In most hospitals, data
can't be shared from one computer system to another, and the long-term
goal of sharing medical information among hospitals remains a distant
dream. Creating a seamless, integrated network of information could do
as much to protect patient safety and improve care as many other medical
breakthroughs. ... The promise is too great to ignore. Using integrated
technology, New York- Presbyterian researchers are creating a Patient
Health Monitor to collect patient data and analyze it with artificial
intelligence. This can be a vital tool for diagnosis and improving care.
With standards in place, information between hospitals can act as an early-warning
system of bioterror or epidemic." May 19, 2003: Skidmore
to use grant for new computer lab. By Brendan McGarry. The Saratogian.
"The AT&T Foundation donated $49,000 to Skidmore College to modernize
and enrich its computer science curriculum, Skidmore announced recently.
... The new computer lab will enhance courses in artificial intelligence
and computer operating systems as well as other courses in the computer
science curriculum." May 19, 2003: Man
or machine? Ivanhoe Broadcast, Inc. / available from News 8 Austin.
"Today, artificial intelligence (AI) helps airplanes fly, makes financial
decisions, and helps diagnose medical conditions. ... The AAAI describes
artificial intelligence as 'the scientific understanding of the mechanisms
underlying thought and intelligent behavior and their embodiment in machines.'
Experts say AI is going to be increasingly important in our lives and
it won't be long before AI allows man to increase his levels of intelligence.
Author, inventor and futurist Ray Kurzweil divides AI into two types,
narrow AI and strong AI. Right now we have narrow AI. Strong AI, he said,
is 'machines that can emulate the full range of diversity and subtlety
of human intelligence.'" May 18, 2003: Case
of the best mysteries- solved. By Melissa Adams in collaboration with
Claudia Peterman. Daily Pilot / available from the Los Angeles Times (no
fee reg. req'd.). "Mystery writers and fans have concluded their
deliberations and the verdicts are in for some of the best whodunits of
the new millennium. ... [M]ystery fans awarded the Agatha to Donna Andrews
for 'You've Got Murder.' With a quirky sleuth from cyberspace at the center
of the action (which involves tracking down the AWOL programmer who created
her), this is one of the most original romps of recent years. Likely to
appeal to computer buffs as well as sci-fi fans, it's a mystery novel
that blurs the boundaries between artificial intelligence and the intellect
that presumably fashioned it." May 18, 2003: 'On
the Nature of Human Romantic Interaction' - Getting Science Into Literature.
By Jim Holt. The New York Times Sunday Book Review (no fee reg. req'd.).
"How do you get science into literature? (Let's skip the argument
over whether this is a good thing to do.) There would seem to be two different
ways. The first is to be a writer of literature with a grasp of science.
For a long time, John Updike was the shining example here -- remember
Ken, the anxiety-ridden biochemist in 'Couples,' or Myron, the loudmouthed
particle physicist in 'Roger's Version'? More recently, the standout has
been Richard Powers, who has put so much science into his undeniably brilliant
novels -- the genetic code in 'The Gold Bug Variations,' artificial intelligence
in 'Galatea 2.2' -- that some critics have accused him of laying it on
with a trowel. The second way of getting science into literature is to
be a scientist who happens to have a literary gift. ... Karl Iagnemma
is a research scientist at M.I.T. who specializes in robotics. He is also
the author of short stories that have won a Paris Review Discovery Prize
and a Pushcart Prize; another of his stories appeared in 'Best American
Short Stories 2002.'" May 17, 2003: 'Matrix'
plugs in to modern anxiety. By Mark Caro. Chicago
Tribune (May 18th) / available from Knight Ridder/Tribune Information
Services and The Ledger-Enquirer. "'There is this long history of
viewing technology and culture . . . with this view that technology eventually
will destroy us,' said Dan Sandin, director of the Electronic Visualization
Laboratory at the University of Illinois at Chicago. These concerns, he
added, date to ancient philosophers fearing that the act of writing would
destroy the oral tradition. 'Socrates was against it because he thought
people would become forgetful.''There is a fear of the unknown, so a lot
of science fiction, particularly in the movies, portrays these future
capabilities in a dark, sinister way,' said Ray Kurzweil, who wrote the
1999 book 'The Age of Spiritual Machines' as well as an essay in the compilation
book 'Taking the Red Pill: Science, Philosophy and Religion in The Matrix.'"The
first was '2001': HAL (the computer) was malevolent, and a lot of future
technology is portrayed in that way.' ... 'There's almost a daily onslaught
of news in which things that seemed to be science fiction have suddenly
become science fact or on the drawing boards, like mergers between electronics
and humans,' said Kurzweil, who runs Kurzweil Technologies in Wellesley,
Mass." May 16, 2003: NSF
researchers present digital solutions to government challenges. NSF
Press Release. "Wireless disaster response, city-sized simulations,
computerized legal advice, a law enforcement data-mining tool and wearable
database uplinks are among the technologies to be demonstrated at dg.o2003,
the annual conference of the National Science Foundation's (NSF) Digital
Government program. ... REGNET: What is accessible? Stanford University
researchers are using artificial intelligence technology to craft a legal
guidance engine that helps people navigate the thicket of government laws
and regulations ... COPLINK: Who's a likely suspect? A law-enforcement
data-mining engine developed by University of Arizona researchers melds
artificial intelligence with detective smarts to turn random clues into
hard arrests." May 16, 2003: Tools
for rules - Rules-based programming will either help us out or create
a different kind of mess. May 16, 2003: Local
firms bring Birmingham into Digital Age. Opinion by Timothy E. Taylor.
Birmingham Business Journal. "Birmingham currently is being defined
by its automotive, banking and health-care business strengths; however,
a new and promising industry is rising. May 16, 2003: First
robot cleaner on sale for a tidy sum. Edinburgh Evening News. "The
world's first robotic vacuum cleaner goes on sale in the UK today with
a price tag of around £1000. The Trilobite navigates its own way around
rooms and has no problem getting to those hard-to-reach spots underneath
tables and the bed, say makers Electrolux. ... Patrick Le Corre, managing
director of Electrolux Floorcare UK, said: 'The Trilobite is the first
intelligent appliance that has real relevance for the home today.'"
May 16, 2003: 'Machines
can take over.' By Jeremy Milarsky. South Florida Sun-Sentinel. "Comparisons
to other movies, particularly science-fiction movies, dominated much of
the conversation before the film began Wednesday night. Would the new
Matrix story be as enjoyable as the first Terminator movies, or Blade
Runner -- both classic stories of an apocalyptic future? ... And yet,
for many fans, the Matrix brings up relevant questions. For a group of
young adults from the Art Institute of Fort Lauderdale those questions
were: 'What do we really know about our reality?' and 'Do we rely too
much on machines?' 'The machines can take over,' said Vaughndi Forbes,
an 18-year-old art student. 'It can actually happen with artificial intelligence.
That's what makes the movie scary.'" May 16, 2003: Grading
Papers Virtually - Computer Software Scores Student Essays. By David
Stevenson. Tech Live / available from ABC News. "Teachers have long
graded stacks of multiple-choice exams with the help of computers. Remember
using a No. 2 pencil to fill in those bubbles? Now many school districts
are trying to save time and money by using computers to grade student
essays. Artificial intelligence software developed by companies such as
Vantage Learning assess answers that require more thought than simple
true or false responses. The company's IntelliMetric software uses roughly
300 preprogrammed writing samples to 'learn' the elements of a good essay.
Once IntelliMetric is trained to recognize a quality response, it applies
its preprogrammed data to a student's essay. ... English teacher Ryan
Brown at Parkland High School in Allentown, Pa., says his initial skepticism
gave way once he put the program to the test." May 15, 2003: Wired
to the Brain of a Rat, a Robot Takes On the World. By Anne Eisenberg.
The New York Times (no fee reg. req'd.). "The nerve center of a conventional
robot is a microprocessor of silicon and metal. But for a robot under
development at Georgia Tech, commands are relayed by 2,000 or so cells
from a rat's brain. A group led by a university researcher has created
a part mechanical, part biological robot that operates on the basis of
the neural activity of rat brain cells grown in a dish. The neural signals
are analyzed by a computer that looks for patterns emitted by the brain
cells and then translates those patterns into robotic movement. If the
neurons fire a certain way, for example, the robot's right wheel rotates
once. The leader of the group, Steve M. Potter, a professor in the Laboratory
for Neuroengineering at Georgia Tech, calls his creation a Hybrot, short
for hybrid robot. 'It's very much a symbiosis,' he said, 'a digital computer
and a living neural network working together.'" May 15, 2003: Giving
Robots the Gift of Sight. By Leander Kahney. Wired News. "An
e-business consultant from the United Kingdom claims to have invented
a breakthrough mechanized vision system with a wide range of potential
applications, from robotics to handwriting recognition. Patrick Andrews,
managing director of Break-Step Productions, a Cambridge-based consultancy,
said he has developed a shape-recognition system called Foveola that closely
mimics the human visual system. ... Andrews, who studied human vision
as a postgraduate student at Cambridge University, said, 'Foveola is based
on decades' worth of research at Cambridge into how people see shapes.
So far, machine vision hasn't taken much notice of what was happening
in biology.' In contrast to current shape-recognition systems, Foveola
is capable of recognizing a broad range of objects, Andrews said. Most
vision systems are designed for specific tasks, such as recognizing text
or industrial components." May 15, 2003: 'Matrix'
virtually frames the future. By Kevin Coughlin. Star-Ledger. "'Essentially,
virtual reality at the level of realism portrayed in 'The Matrix' will
happen, and we will spend most of our time in virtual environments' by
the 2030s, futurist Ray Kurzweil says in an e-mail interview. ... K. Eric
Drexler, an engineer who claims credit for coining the term 'nanotechnology,'
dismisses the films' premise of humans-as-crops. 'The specifics are silly,
but the issues raised are not,' says Drexler, chairman of the Foresight
Institute, a California nonprofit that promotes nanotech. His chief fear
is not malevolent artificial intelligence. It's wicked humans using AI
'to enslave us, through abuse of surveillance technologies and so forth.'
Hans Moravec, an expert on robotics and AI at Carnegie Mellon University,
sides with the machines. Sure, today's cleverest computers are no smarter
than fishy creatures from our primordial past. 'But they're evolving about
10 million times faster, so (machines) should overtake us within 50 years,'
Moravec says, via e-mail." May 15, 2003: Making
Computers Understand. Column by Leslie Walker. Washington Post TechNews.
"Eli Abir, who never used a computer until 1993, seems an improbable
character to illustrate how innovation is alive and well in techno-land.
Yet my encounter with him helped convince me of just that. Abir, 46, claims
to have unlocked the mystery of 'context' in human language with a series
of algorithms that enable computers to decipher the meaning of sentences
-- a puzzle that has stumped scientists for decades. ... Abir's challenge
-- and that of computer science -- is how to help machines 'understand'
context in human language, to get around the ambiguity created when words
mean different things depending on usage. 'Bar' means something different
when we say 'the corner bar' than when we say 'she raised the bar' or
'he passed the bar.' There have been several approaches to helping computers
grasp those distinctions. One is a 'grammatical' method that tries to
tag every word and apply language rules. Another is a statistical system
that makes word-to-word comparisons in previously translated text and
then consults the matches later to calculate probable meanings when it
encounters each word again in untranslated text. Abir's approach involves
a variation of the second method. His company spent last year encoding
his ideas into software algorithms that perform novel forms of pattern
analysis that rely on phrases -- rather than words -- as the core unit
of meaning." May 15, 2003: Rage
against the machines - Should people worry about technology upgrading
beyond us? By Wayne Falda. South Bend Tribune. "Three-year-olds of
the world unite! You toddlers have been surpassed by a machine. PeopleBot,
a 4 1/2 -foot-tall robot, is superior to you in that one category most
revered by your parents. PeopleBot is obedient. It follows orders each
and every time. Worse yet, PeopleBot is already here -- right in the town
where you live. On the third floor of Fitzpatrick Hall at the University
of Notre Dame, the slender robot stands silently as if to await its next
command. 'In many respects it's like a 3-year-old in that it can learn
complex action sequences and follow them,' mused Matthias Scheutz, an
assistant professor of computer science and engineering. ... These days
computer scientists hotly debate whether the era of artificial intelligence
as depicted in the movies will ever come to pass. Scheutz has his doubts.
'But I think that there is nothing in principle that prevents us from
reaching that level,' he said. 'I don't see us going in the direction
of replicating humans to make these Frankenstein machines that everybody
is afraid of,' he said. 'Why would we do that?'" | |||