Dear Individual,

The main approach to research in artificial
intelligence seems to concentrate on
expanding the ways computers can use
problem-solving knowledge. This research
has already led to the development of computers
that are capable of performing complicated -
though extremely specialized tasks, for example,
artificial intelligence systems have been produced
that can diagnose diseases and locate minerals
in the earth. They require programming vast amounts
of knowledge into the computer to provide the
basis for its "thinking" abilities.

To diagnose a desease, for instance, a computer needs
to be given knowledge about thousands of possible
symptoms and how these symptoms are related to
hundreds of possible diseases.

Artificial intelligence researchers are seeking to
build other systems that would be helpful in the
workplace, in the home, and so on. Another example,
is they are trying to develop computers that can
"see" what robots in factories are working on and
guide the robots' movements accordingly.

Who knows where all this will lead?

cont'd ...

In my view Artificial Intelligence can help
alleviate some of the difficulties faced
by human beings. For example in areas where
humans have serious limitations such as
painstaking activities, laborious tasks,
in the completion of repetitive and time-
consuming tasks, as well as certain dangerous
tasks.

Artificial Intelligence can find applications in
space exploration. Machines have the ability to
endure hostile environments and planetary atmospheres
would not affect their physical state and functioning.
Intelligent robots can be used to explore ocean depths.
Emotions that are often a hindrance to rational
thinking would not be a hindrance to artificial
thinkers. Sentiments that are associated with moods
that effect human efficiency won't be the case with
Artificial Intelligence.

Machines can never replace humans but they can be used
to work for our benefit.

Machines can never replace humans but they can be used
to work for our benefit.
Foxy,
Sadly, people treat other people like machines already but hopefully we can reverse that trend. Yes machines do a great job & we pay their owners more than we pay the human workers. One thing about machines is that they either work for you or they don't. But they don't manipulate & exploit.

Dear Individual,

That was the point that I was trying
to make, that there is no ideal replacement
for human beings but Artificial Intelligence
can help alleviate the difficulties faced
by mankind. Machines can serve humans well
where human intelligence has serious limitations.
Owing to the programmes in them they can be
made to manage themselves and their time to
complete assigned tasks. Emotions that are often
a hindrance to rational thinking are not a
hindrance for artificial thinkers. Robots can act
logically and take the right decisions.
Sentiments associated with moods that effect human
efficiency won't be the case with Artificial Intelligence.

Hi Foxy,
I’m a fan of the doco too –and anything in a similar vein.

AI can already whoop-the-socks of human intelligence in any form of calculation;can checkmate any champion we send against it; can produce passable versions of our literary masters ; can navigate the most intricate of passages through the solar system and out to the heliopause, and my feelings are it wont be long before it will outdo human intelligence in our last remaining strongholds.

Another tantalising angle is, that not only will AI be “cheaper, better,faster” at doing things we have been accustomed to doing ourselves , but full-blown AI will quite possibly be alien enough to come up with visions & concepts that we could not have even imagined on our own.

It came to me that HG Wells had written something, that if tweaked just a little, could illustrate the current position of humanity v AI :

“No one would have believed in the [ early years of the 21st Century] that this world was being watched keenly and closely by intelligences greater than man's… that as men [& women] busied themselves about their various concerns they were scrutinised and studied, perhaps almost as narrowly as a man with a microscope might scrutinise the transient creatures that swarm and multiply in a drop of water. With infinite complacency men went to and fro over this globe about their little affairs, serene in their assurance of their empire over matter. It is possible that the infusoria under the microscope do the same. No one gave a thought to [ artificial intelligence ] … as sources of human danger, or thought of [ it, except ] to dismiss the idea … as impossible or improbable [or, only able to do what is was programmed to do ] . It is curious to recall some of the mental habits of those departed days. At most terrestrial men fancied [ that they were born with unique qualities and were destined to always to sit at the top of the pyramid ]… Yet across the gulf of [cyber] space, minds that are to our minds as ours are to those of the beasts that perish, intellects vast and cool and unsympathetic, regarded this earth with envious eyes, and slowly and surely drew [ their ] plans against us.”