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Artificial intelligence Artificial Intelligence: A Glimpse into the Future A young teenage girl enters the psychologists, Eliza's, office apprehensively and sits down upon a chair. The girl begins by saying, Men are all alike. In what way? replies Eliza.
Well they are always trying to run things in one way or another, the girl laments. Can you think of a specific example? Well my boyfriend made me come here. Your boyfriend made you come here?
He says Im depressed all the time. Im sorry to hear that you are depressed. Its true that I am unhappy. Do you think coming here will help you not to be unhappy? Perhaps I can get along with my mother better. Tell me more about your family?
Eliza inquires. And the conversation goes on. While this seems like a very ordinary psychologist and patient session, it is indeed not. Eliza is an artificial intelligence program. She is the result of researcher, Joseph Wiezbaums, attempt to make a program that can converse in English. Eliza amazed people when she appeared in the late 1960 s.
She was able to converse about any subject, because she stored vast subject information in her data banks. In addition Eliza was deftly able to pick up speech patterns. Suprisingly, after creating one of the most famous programs Wiezbaum objected to bonds that interviewees were making with his creation, and denounced the intelligence of Eliza. She was intelligent, however, she could not think for herself, she was a product of sophisticated programming (Waltz).
While it seemed like Eliza could understand the girl, she no more understood the girl and her problems than an alarm clock knows when to wake someone up. Eliza was one of the first programs using artificial intelligence developed; one can only imagine what the future brings. The study of Artificial intelligence (AI) is developing rapidly. As we approach the twenty-first century new technology waits in the wings. Yet people worldwide seem to have a fear of this research and its advancements. Some have legitimate ethical or social questions about the benefits and potential costs of some of the scientific and technological advances.
However, public debate is often hindered by a basic lack of understanding of fundamental issues such as risk or scientific fact. After all, some people consider the television show the X-Files to be a quasi-documentary. Nevertheless, the advanced development of AI will bring more benefits to society than anything else, and we should embrace the possibilities of its integration into our society. In order to form an educated opinion, one must understand exactly what AI is.
AI is a term that in its broadest sense would indicate the ability of computer to perform the same kinds of functions that characterize human thought, like decision making. With the growth of modern science and technology, the search for AI has taken two major directions: psychological and physiological research into the nature of human thought, and the technological development of increasingly sophisticated computing systems (Rheingold 10). In sophisticated computing systems, the term AI has been applied to computer systems and programs capable of performing tasks more complex than straightforward programming, although they are still much removed from the realm of actual thought. The most important fields of research in this area are information processing, pattern recognition, game-playing computers, and applied fields such as medical diagnosis (McCarthy). Current research in information processing deals with programs that enable a computer to understand written or spoken information and to produce summaries, answer specific questions, or redistribute information to the users interested in specific areas of this information. Essential to such programs is the ability of the system to generate grammatically correct sentences and to establish links between words, ideas, and to recognize associations with other ideas.
As in grammar programs in medicine, which analyze the disease symptoms, medical history, and laboratory test results of a patient, and then suggests a diagnosis to the physician. The diagnostic program, which is designed to perform tasks in specialized areas as a human would, is an example of an expert system. (Waltz). Expert systems take computers a step beyond straightforward programming, as they are based on a technique called rule-based inference, in which previously established rule systems are used to process the data. Despite their sophistication, such systems still do not approach the complexity of true intelligent thought. Even though technologies have yet to develop systems, which achieve the complexities of true thought, technologists have already put their accomplishments in the field of practice.
Another assistance AI technology provides to society are system programs that help to diagnose problems on PCs or company computer systems. The use of these programs for both hardware and software are now in widespread use. Diagnostic systems based on AI technology are being built into photocopiers, computer operating systems, and office automation tools to reduce service calls (Epstein 12). Other common examples of expert systems include spell check and grammar check in word processing programs.
People do not realize how much AI has already affected their lives and that their advancement can be even more helpful. Grammar check and spell check are not perfect, but with the advancement of AI they could be. While expert systems are helping people with searches online and checking their spelling and grammar other programs are helping people with more advanced tasks. Text to speech programs are the products of advanced AI (Waltz).
These programs enable their user to place text into the program and the program will read the text aloud. This helps blind people explore the Internet or read various pieces of literature. Another helpful tool is a voice recognition program. These programs work with the user to learn their voice patterns. Once the users voice patterns are learned, the user can dictate what he or she wants to write into a microphone and the computer will type it using correct grammar and spelling.
This program benefits the blind, people who cant type well because of arthritis, carpal-tunnel syndrome or some other disability. In addition to these people helping programs there are some that make society flow easier. For instance, credit card providers, telephone companies, mortgage lenders, banks, and the U. S.
Government employ AI systems to detect fraud and quicken financial transactions (Hinrichs 28). This is extremely helpful since daily transactions are in the billions. These programs are able to keep track of peoples daily usage and can automatically determine whether or not the credit card holder is at his or her limit. Some stores have programs that can check to see how many transactions patrons have made with their credit card or checking account that day.
If multiple checks of high amounts have been written or you have charged a lot to your account, the system will suggest that the employee ask for ID. This helps to prevent fraud and theft. While one might just be Christmas shopping and writing a lot of checks that day, it could very well be a thief who stole the credit card or check and is on a shopping spree. Another, maybe not beneficial, but interesting aspect of AI is the computer game.
One can buy machines that can play master level chess for a few hundred dollars today. There is some AI in them, but they play well against people mainly through computation by looking at hundreds of thousands of positions in order to see which move is best. To beat a world champion by computation instead of skill requires the computer to be able to look at 200 million positions per second (Waltz). This same computation can be applied to any game where the user is playing against the computer. Referring back to Eliza, she is a production system. A production system consists of a collection of condition and action pairs.
Collectively these are known as production rules. A production system uses an interpreter to search through these production rules. Actions are performed whenever the condition is true. The conditions in these cases would compare the input with similar statements from the computers database. When the computer had found similar cases, it would trigger the action part of the production rules. In Eliza's case, the action was a response that was relevant to the conversation.
These programs have the potential of eventually recreating human intelligence (McCarthy). Eliza serves is a step towards the development of practical, useful artificial intelligence. If AI is already in use and helping society has they potential to revolutionize society. From automated cars to household robots, AI has the potential to effect our lives a great deal, maybe even a little too much for some people. An application presently in the works is an automated car. The user can choose from a menu or type in where they want to go and how fast they want the car to drive.
This would allow children, elderly, blind, and drunks to be able to safely reach destinations without human fault car accidents. If all cars were automated it would be possible for speed limits to increase and have high levels of safety maintained. It could also permit a husband to be driven to work, then have the car sent home for his wifes use, and permit her to send it back for him at the end of the day or vice versa. This would also be the end of parents chauffeuring their kids around.
But the main advantage of this would be greater safety. Car accidents contribute to a lot the deaths in the world and with automated cars this would eliminate car-related deaths almost entirely. An automated car has already been produced and is being tested. However at present it is such high technology that its $ 400, 000 -$ 800, 000 price that is not economically feasible for the general public (Zyons 182).
Perhaps increased publication would generate public support of this project with the interest funding more research. Eventually prices will fall as the technology is refined and mainlined, making the cost more reasonable possibly to around the price of a luxury car today. A further type of AI involves the use of neural networks, which are modeled on the way that animal brains work. They can learn how to do things. One can teach a neural network to perform tasks varying from simple mathematical functions to tasks as complicated as driving cars. Neural networks can also do handwriting recognition (Zyons 183).
This way the US Mail Service uses neural networks to recognize the handwritten zip codes on letters, so that people would not have to do it by hand. A popular development in the domestic sphere would be a robot servant. Such a robot would make keeping house easy, as the robot could be responsible for time-consuming tasks including vacuuming, dishwashing, and dusting. The house or apartment will be clean and neat and things will be kept put away. You could either send the robot to the store or, more likely, by an automatic delivery system have your groceries delivered to the house (McCarthy).
The automatic delivery system is almost already in use today. You can order your groceries and have them delivered to your house. The only difference is delivery people deliver the items, in the future a robot could deliver them. While all of this seems within our current technological reach, AI has to be further developed. Robots must be around of their surroundings, such as knowing not to step on babies and detecting danger.
Robots have to learn to not step on babies, detect danger in the house, and must be able to speak and communicate well. Those opposed to AI are concerned about the extent to which the technology will grow. Will it take over humans? The answer theoretically is yes; they could (de Garis).
However, that type of AI robot is many years away and scientists can control what the robot thinks and make sure that we are able to control them. Although we should not worry about these problems until they become more viable. Once we design a robot with a significant amount of intelligence, the search will begin on how to control the robot. Moreover, it is pointless to start looking for a solution on how to control them when the technology required for building is unattainable. Ultimately, AI is the virtual frontier computer science. Advanced-level computer languages, as well as computer interfaces and word-processors owe their existence to the research into AI.
The theory and insights brought about by AI research will set the trend in the future of computing. The products available today are only bits and pieces of what are soon to follow, but they are a movement towards the future of AI. The advancements in the quest for artificial intelligence have, and will continue to affect and benefit our jobs, our education, and our lives. Bibliography Works Cited De Garis, Dr. Hugo.
Moral Dilemmas Concerning the Ultra Intelligent Machine. Brain Builder Group. May 1998. 2 November 1999. Epstein, Jeffery. Computers with Emotions.
The Futurist. Apr. 1998: 12. Hinrichs, Bruce. Computing the Mind. The Humanist. Mar. -Apr. 1998: 26 - 31.
McCarthy, John. What Is Artificial Intelligence. 5 December 1998. 1 November 1999. Rheingold, Howard. Virtual Reality. New York: Summit Books, 1991. Waltz, David L.
Artificial Intelligence: Realizing the Ultimate Promises of Computing. NEC Research Institute and the Computing Research Association (1996): 2 November 1999. Zyons, Daniel. Immorality at Last. Forbes.
November 1998: 180 - 184. 336
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Research essay sample on Artificial Intelligence Neural Networks
