Re: Cost of AI (was Re: [sl4] FAI development within academia.)

From: BillK (pharos@gmail.com)
Date: Wed Feb 25 2009 - 10:21:39 MST


On Wed, Feb 25, 2009 at 4:21 PM, Matt Mahoney wrote:
>
> We don't have a choice. We want it, so we will spend it and get AI. Not out of some grand
> design, but out of an internet that gets incrementally smarter until it is no longer clear when
> you are talking to a human and when you are talking to a program.
>
> Sorry, history is full of wildly optimistic projections about AI. If it were possible to solve a $1
> quadrillion problem for only $1 trillion, we (who are collectively much smarter than you)
> would have figured it out long ago.
>

Sorry, Matt. Nobody will fund a $1 quadrillion project.
It would be financial and political suicide.

You might be correct, but estimates like that are not on the path to AGI.
You'll need to scale down to smaller projects with quicker interim
results if you want to get funding. Funding sources will not even
consider your proposals.

Call it narrow AI if you like. These smaller projects will get
development money.
Accumulate enough of these and maybe, eventually, they will add up to
your total and we'll get something that looks a lot like AGI.

It is similar to the way evolution developed the eye. Every
intermediate stage has to have added value.

BillK



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