HAL 9000 is Watching You

In a way, the future is now. We have great A.I. depending on what you consider great and what you consider intelligence. The article has a primer on the history of AI, with all the hopes and fears it summons. If you’ve ever spoken to one of those robot voice mail systems, where they quote back to you what you said, you know that it’s just a matter of time before we have to deal with the HAL 9000 at the DMV.

The article is generally bullish on the idea that we could have artificial intelligence that could fool a human within the next ten years, though there was a lot of nay voices, too. But if the optimists are correct, this would have a huge impact on our lives—hopefully for the better but probably for the worse.

The articles describes that fool-a-human moment as a sigularity in artificial intelligence, with a singularity being the moment when the technology comes out faster than the culture can apply it…like inventing a can opener before inventing the can.

But the funny thing is that we already have a cultural interface for robots—science fiction movies. That’s where we’ll start, anyway. But the better, more interesting idea is how will we use robots in ways we haven’t even thought of yet. What if I could write a novel with a robot? You could feed him lines and story ideas. He could ask you questions about plot points, character. Maybe not, but what about a robot biographer? Start with a basic questionaire, follow-ups, and your AI pal makes the connections.

The dark underside of AI is that it could apply human-like intelligence to tasks beyond our capacity. For example, a robot could eavesdrop on a phone line—or even multiple phone lines—and take notes, make connections, create advantages.