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Whatever happened to machines that think?
Artificial Intelligence Posted by Aelhswith on Wednesday April 27, @08:51PM
from the play-it-again-Sam dept.

[article] For years there have been promises to deliver technology that will make computers we can chat to like friends, robots that function as autonomous servants, and one day (for better or worse) even produce conscious machines. Yet we appear to be as far away as ever from any of these goals.

Many scientists working in areas that were once considered core AI now refuse even to be associated with the term. To them, the phrase "artificial intelligence" has been forever tainted by a previous generation of researchers who hyped the technology and the fabled singularity beyond reason. But could that change with the latest contender?
In the next few months, after being patiently nurtured for 22 years, an artificial brain called Cyc (pronounced "psych") will be put online for the world to interact with. And it's only going to get cleverer. Opening Cyc up to the masses is expected to accelerate the rate at which it learns, giving it access to the combined knowledge of millions of people around the globe as it hoovers up new facts from web pages, webcams and data entered manually by anyone who wants to contribute. Crucially, Cyc's creator says it has developed a human trait no other AI system has managed to imitate: common sense. "I believe we are heading towards a singularity and we will see it in less than 10 years," says Doug Lenat of Cycorp, the system's creator.

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    Cyc Dead Last in 2003 Project HALO
    by G. Roper on Monday April 10, @10:55PM
    Cyc is way overdue. Lenat has promised critical breakthroughs for decades now and nothing has come of it. He jumped to MCC and, when they became defunct, survived their passing by re-selling the same old promise: in 10 years Cyc will reach "critical mass". Now, in Project HALO, he's selling the story to venture capitalist Paul Allen (of Vulcan Group).

    But in 2003 in Project HALO, Cyc was beaten badly by two other AI systems and came in dead last. Despite the apparent advantage of 20 years of "common sense" programming and years of scrutiny by developers, Cyc's performance was clearly the worst of the 3 programs, taking 27 hours to solve the problems (versus Cyc is way overdue. Lenat has promised critical breakthroughs for decades now and nothing has come of it. He jumped to MCC and, when they became defunct, survived their passing by re-selling the same old promise: in 10 years Cyc will reach "critical mass". Now, in Project HALO, he's selling the story to venture capitalist Paul Allen (of Vulcan Group).

    But in 2003 in Project HALO, Cyc was beaten badly by two other AI systems and came in dead last. Despite the apparent advantage of 20 years of "common sense" programming and years of scrutiny by developers, Cyc's performance was clearly the worst of the 3 programs, taking 27 hours to solve the problems (versus
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