I've been playing with Cleverbot lately. It started when I watched the CBC documentary, Remote Control War (available online). Various experts discussed the inevitability of military deployment of autonomous robots. Right now the US is menacing people on the ground in Pakistan with remote control drones. It's like being buzzed by great big annoying insects that you can't reach with a flyswatter...except they are quite likely to kill you, or your neighbour, or both. The drone's controllers are in the US, sitting at consoles, drinking Starbucks, making decisions and punching the clock. It's bad.
Autonomous robots would maybe be even worse, as they'd just go on in there and make decisions for themselves about when to kill people and when to hold their fire. The army might soon be able to make a pitch that their robots' AI can, say, distinguish between combatants and civilians, but my understanding of AI research is that such a thing is just not possible. As it is, human's can't even do it. That's why they invented the concept collateral damage. It might be possible to have robots act reliably under controlled, laboratory conditions, but the manifold variables of real-life encounters simply can't be predicted nor programmed for ahead of time. (For more on this, see What Computers Can't Do by Hubert Dreyfus.) There will always be a big margin of error and downright randomness. Hilarious in the movies — remember ED-209? — but truly brown trowsers, brain-altering, high-stress awful if you're stuck on the receiving end.
So I went to chit-chat with Cleverbot and see how pop culture AI is coming along. Remember Eliza, the artificial intelligence therapist designed in the 60s? (There's an online version.) I played with Eliza a lot in the 90s and in my opinion, Cleverbot isn't doing a much better job at sounding human than she did. Cb has some potential because it's collecting new data all the time from people who play with it. In this way it's like 20Q, which is pretty impressive. At least, the classic version, which has been played the most, is really really good. But 20Q would be easier to design than Cleverbot because there is a set formula and rigid parameters for how the questions go (20Q means 20 questions).
I'd like to know more about the programming behind the syntactical structures in Cleverbot's system. It seems to have Eliza-like strategies of throwing your words back at you in the form of a question. It also throws out random stuff that other people have typed in — often funny and interesting in a totally nonsequitor-ish, Dada kind of way. It has a very poor memory, however, and can't really follow the conversation beyond a few lines. I'm not sure why it's so shallow. But it is remarkably good at grammar! Sometimes words are spelled wrong, and the content makes no sense, but it almost always responds with statements that are structurally valid.
All in all, though, it does a poor job of following a train of thought or applying logic in any meaningful way. Cleverbot is fun, and it's flaws are revealing about how language works, but I don't find it convincing, and it actually make me think that info-tainment AI hasn't progressed much since Eliza days. I'm sure that DND probably has all kinds of way more sophisticated work in progress, but if the military tries to tell me that they've got an autonomous robotic system that can reliably adhere to the Geneva convention, I will not believe them. (Not that anybody calling the shots gives a shit about the Geneva convention anymore.)
I feel that I could exercise some influence on pigeons that have been deployed to kill me. Robots, not so much. But that is because I am sort of 'one' with the animal kingdom. - L.M. 2-28-2011 6:30 pm
Skinner (*shudder*).
Pigeons...very very strange creatures. They always know where they are. I wouldn't mess with them, myself.
Harun Farocki's War at a Distance (2003) has lots of great historic footage on various ways that people have tried to control the trajectories of bombs from remote locations, including one thingy where the bomb was actually attached with wires and that were controlled from the plane. - sally mckay 2-28-2011 7:48 pm
I watched the Remote Control War show, which was on right after a Nature Of Things about raccoons, and I had thoughts of deploying raccoons as smart weapons. - Rob (guest) 2-28-2011 8:26 pm
More about G.I. Joe (the pigeon) here on Radio Lab. - sally mckay 2-28-2011 10:13 pm
The more I think about animals in warfare, the more it make sense as a valid comparison to machine intelligence. Yes, AI is still bad at natural language recognition, as Sally points out, but that's a very different task from the sorts of guidance/pattern recognition tasks required of a weapon. Animals are bad at human language too, but some of them are very effective semi-autonomous weapons. Horses in particular have been weaponized for centuries, but even the smartest horse can only understand a few words of English, and knows nothing about syntax. But as every horse owner knows, they can tell good people from bad people, and find their way through unfamiliar terrain even with an injured or unconscious rider. Designers of new weapons might even want to start thinking about obsolete military strategy based around cavalry and carrier pigeons. - rob (guest) 3-01-2011 4:48 pm
I think I am a good person, but horses don't agree. - sally mckay 3-01-2011 7:03 pm
That drone documentary reminded me of Karel Čapek's play, Rossum's Universal Robots. The part where the authorities decided to utilize robots as the perfect soldiers. - VB 3-02-2011 2:08 am
A good article on Watson, the Jeopary robot, by Sean Dorrance Kelly and Hubert Dreyfus. (thanks to H.)
Joester, that regifting thing is aggravating me.
VB, Čapek's robot critters look like Kraftwerk.
Update: I looked up the regiftable trick and now its even more annoying.
I've been playing with Cleverbot lately. It started when I watched the CBC documentary, Remote Control War (available online). Various experts discussed the inevitability of military deployment of autonomous robots. Right now the US is menacing people on the ground in Pakistan with remote control drones. It's like being buzzed by great big annoying insects that you can't reach with a flyswatter...except they are quite likely to kill you, or your neighbour, or both. The drone's controllers are in the US, sitting at consoles, drinking Starbucks, making decisions and punching the clock. It's bad.
link
Autonomous robots would maybe be even worse, as they'd just go on in there and make decisions for themselves about when to kill people and when to hold their fire. The army might soon be able to make a pitch that their robots' AI can, say, distinguish between combatants and civilians, but my understanding of AI research is that such a thing is just not possible. As it is, human's can't even do it. That's why they invented the concept collateral damage. It might be possible to have robots act reliably under controlled, laboratory conditions, but the manifold variables of real-life encounters simply can't be predicted nor programmed for ahead of time. (For more on this, see What Computers Can't Do by Hubert Dreyfus.) There will always be a big margin of error and downright randomness. Hilarious in the movies — remember ED-209? — but truly brown trowsers, brain-altering, high-stress awful if you're stuck on the receiving end.
So I went to chit-chat with Cleverbot and see how pop culture AI is coming along. Remember Eliza, the artificial intelligence therapist designed in the 60s? (There's an online version.) I played with Eliza a lot in the 90s and in my opinion, Cleverbot isn't doing a much better job at sounding human than she did. Cb has some potential because it's collecting new data all the time from people who play with it. In this way it's like 20Q, which is pretty impressive. At least, the classic version, which has been played the most, is really really good. But 20Q would be easier to design than Cleverbot because there is a set formula and rigid parameters for how the questions go (20Q means 20 questions).
I'd like to know more about the programming behind the syntactical structures in Cleverbot's system. It seems to have Eliza-like strategies of throwing your words back at you in the form of a question. It also throws out random stuff that other people have typed in — often funny and interesting in a totally nonsequitor-ish, Dada kind of way. It has a very poor memory, however, and can't really follow the conversation beyond a few lines. I'm not sure why it's so shallow. But it is remarkably good at grammar! Sometimes words are spelled wrong, and the content makes no sense, but it almost always responds with statements that are structurally valid.
All in all, though, it does a poor job of following a train of thought or applying logic in any meaningful way. Cleverbot is fun, and it's flaws are revealing about how language works, but I don't find it convincing, and it actually make me think that info-tainment AI hasn't progressed much since Eliza days. I'm sure that DND probably has all kinds of way more sophisticated work in progress, but if the military tries to tell me that they've got an autonomous robotic system that can reliably adhere to the Geneva convention, I will not believe them. (Not that anybody calling the shots gives a shit about the Geneva convention anymore.)
- sally mckay 2-28-2011 2:08 pm
Of course, this is nothing new:
http://historywired.si.edu/object.cfm?ID=353
- Rob (guest) 2-28-2011 5:56 pm
I feel that I could exercise some influence on pigeons that have been deployed to kill me. Robots, not so much. But that is because I am sort of 'one' with the animal kingdom.
- L.M. 2-28-2011 6:30 pm
Skinner (*shudder*).
Pigeons...very very strange creatures. They always know where they are. I wouldn't mess with them, myself.
Harun Farocki's War at a Distance (2003) has lots of great historic footage on various ways that people have tried to control the trajectories of bombs from remote locations, including one thingy where the bomb was actually attached with wires and that were controlled from the plane.
- sally mckay 2-28-2011 7:48 pm
If you love freedom, thank a pigeon:
http://nationalpigeonday.blogspot.com/2008/03/history-of-cher-ami.html
I watched the Remote Control War show, which was on right after a Nature Of Things about raccoons, and I had thoughts of deploying raccoons as smart weapons.
- Rob (guest) 2-28-2011 8:26 pm
More about G.I. Joe (the pigeon) here on Radio Lab.
- sally mckay 2-28-2011 10:13 pm
The more I think about animals in warfare, the more it make sense as a valid comparison to machine intelligence. Yes, AI is still bad at natural language recognition, as Sally points out, but that's a very different task from the sorts of guidance/pattern recognition tasks required of a weapon. Animals are bad at human language too, but some of them are very effective semi-autonomous weapons. Horses in particular have been weaponized for centuries, but even the smartest horse can only understand a few words of English, and knows nothing about syntax. But as every horse owner knows, they can tell good people from bad people, and find their way through unfamiliar terrain even with an injured or unconscious rider. Designers of new weapons might even want to start thinking about obsolete military strategy based around cavalry and carrier pigeons.
- rob (guest) 3-01-2011 4:48 pm
I think I am a good person, but horses don't agree.
- sally mckay 3-01-2011 7:03 pm
http://www.regiftable.com/regiftingrobinpopup.html
- joester (guest) 3-01-2011 11:19 pm
sorry, I meant for there to be text with that link.
A.I. conversations have not progressed - but that's kind of the holy grail of AI. This is a gimick, but it's clever.
http://www.regiftable.com/regiftingrobinpopup.html
And this is a much more useful use of actual AI
http://www.20q.net
- joester (guest) 3-01-2011 11:21 pm
That drone documentary reminded me of Karel Čapek's play, Rossum's Universal Robots. The part where the authorities decided to utilize robots as the perfect soldiers.
- VB 3-02-2011 2:08 am
A good article on Watson, the Jeopary robot, by Sean Dorrance Kelly and Hubert Dreyfus. (thanks to H.)
Joester, that regifting thing is aggravating me.
VB, Čapek's robot critters look like Kraftwerk.
Update: I looked up the regiftable trick and now its even more annoying.
- sally mckay 3-02-2011 4:35 am
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дизайн человека помощь
ворота в дизайн человека
- spohzwep (guest) 12-01-2022 11:45 pm