[ExI] Oxford scientists edge toward quantum PC with 10b qubits.

[Adrian Tymes]

On Mon, Jan 31, 2011 at 8:57 AM, Kelly Anderson <kellycoinguy at gmail.com> wrote:
> So when IBM creates a machine with the specific programming task of
> "Pass the Turing Test" that won't be intelligence either, because it
> was programmed to pass the Turing test... right???

There is reason to believe that the Turing Test can not be passed, without
the kind of generality needed for AI (or, more properly, Artificial General
Intelligence, which is what people often mean when they mention "true"
AI), and that Watson, chessmaster computers, and other specific-feat
programs have yet to display.

The reason?  Talk about one subject.  Then talk about something else.  A
human can handle this - even if they are not an expert in all things (which
no human is, though some try to pretend they are).  These AIs completely
break down.  If they were capable of conversing on one topic using limited
terms and grammar, they can not form coherent responses on any other
topic.

Which leads to the interesting question: how, exactly, does one distinguish
the best current conversational AIs from humans?  It is easy for most people
to do (if they are aware that they might be talking to an AI and have been
tasked with identifying it), but is the process easy to describe?

Among the things I am aware of:
1. Lack of memory.  In many cases, the AI won't remember what you said
two sentences ago, let alone display human-equivalent medium to long
term memory.
2. Inability to learn - which is a consequence of 1.  You can not teach one
of these AIs even a simple game, in the manner you would conversationally
teach an 8 year old.
3. Lack of initiative.  Most of these AIs are reactive only.  When deprived of
outside stimuli, such as a human talking to it, they just sit there and do
nothing, as if unaware of the passage of time.  (In a human, this would be
called "vegetative state", and is one of the criteria used to legally designate
a given human body as something to be no longer treated as a full human
being unless and until it recovers from that condition - which, in most cases,
is seen as effectively impossible due to the causes of that condition.)