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From: iic@dcs.ed.ac.uk (Ian Clarke)
Subject: Re: Does AI belong in neural nets?
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References: <4gm5c9$phk@saba.info.ucla.edu> <D> <DnLF5n.G7n.0.staffin.dcs.ed.ac.uk@dcs.ed.ac.uk> <4h80e2$8cc@news.cis.okstate.edu>
Date: Sun, 3 Mar 1996 21:28:59 GMT
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In article <4h80e2$8cc@news.cis.okstate.edu>, jpc@a.cs.okstate.edu (John Chandler) writes:
> In article <DnLF5n.G7n.0.staffin.dcs.ed.ac.uk@dcs.ed.ac.uk>,
> Ian Clarke <iic@dcs.ed.ac.uk> wrote:
> 
>     [munch]
> 
> >Thirdly, you claim that "AI has been an over-hyped and disappointing 
> >field".  For such a disappointing field it is strange that the AI
> >department here in Edinburgh makes five times more profit from research
> >than any other department, of _any_ type (disappointing or not), in the
> >United Kingdom.
> 
>  
> Certainly AI was overhyped for twenty years or more.

You are ignoring the primary issue here.  It is very easy to criticise a
field, if I felt that it would be useful to my argument I could make
similar criticisms of A-Life, Connectionism, and any other reasonably
modern field you care to mention.  The primary issue here is whether
Neural Networks are a part of Artificial Intelligence, and the claim that
AI was at one-time overhyped, whether true or false, does not really
affect this discussion.

> At least since 1957, some researcher or other has been saying
> "In ten years, a computer will be chess champion
> of the world."
> 
> Is it not true that Donald Michie, who was at that time a professor
> in your present department, wagered 1000 pounds with
> chessmaster David Levy that a program would defeat Levy within
> ten years?  Michie lost that bet.
> Michie certainly engaged in overhyping;
> I assume he was disappointed when he had to pay the 1000 pounds.

Just because I am studying in Prof. Michie's old department doesn't make
me responsible for his misjudments :-)
As I mentioned previously, the meat of almost every new field of research
is optimism concerning achievements, this optimism is rarely justified in
the given time-frame, but give those chess programs another few years...
> 
> AI is now finding successful applications and should find
> wider application in the years to come.
> 
> "Making a profit" is not, IMHO, a decent measure of the
> worth of an academic department or discipline.

Maybe not a decent measure in an ideal world, but this is the real world
and if something is making money, many people would see it as very
worthwhile.  IMHO the search for Artificial Intelligence is one of the
most challenging and exciting fields of this century, and, _together_
with Neural Networks, Artificial Life and other related fields, we can
strive towards seeing an intelligent machine in our life-times.

-- 
|IAN CLARKE        I.Clarke@sms.ed.ac.uk  "..until human voices wake  |
|                  iic@dcs.ed.ac.uk       us, and we drown" - Shelley |
|                  I.Clarke@ed.ac.uk      ianc@aisb.ed.ac.uk          |
