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Article 6279 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: nagle@netcom.com (John Nagle)
Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy
Subject: Re: 5-step program to AI
Message-ID: <1ljlk8d.nagle@netcom.com>
Date: 17 Jun 92 06:50:28 GMT
References: <1992Jun12.192537.32302@mp.cs.niu.edu> <60831@aurs01.UUCP>
Organization: Netcom - Online Communication Services  (408 241-9760 guest)
Lines: 39

> rickert@mp.cs.niu.edu (Neil Rickert)
>   0:	A rock.  Not much here.
>   1:	A single celled creature (a protozoan for example).  Not bad
> 	considering that it has only one cell.
>   2:	A frog.  A big jump.
>   3:	A mouse.  Many capabilities of mammals which are not seen in
> 	reptiles and amphibians.  Evidence of consciousness is
> 	rather more persuasive for mammals than for a frog.
>   4:	A chimpanzee.  Very intelligent compared with most mammals,
> 	but lacking language, and presumably well short of human
> 	intelligence.
>   5:	Human intelligence.

       Hans Moravec once referred to the Hopkins Beast (don't send me
E-mail asking what it is, read up on the history of the field) as
the "bacteria-level AI" milestone.

       Currently, we seem to be in the insect-level AI era.  Various 
researchers have demonstrated artificial insects of varying degrees of
functionality, and work is proceeding well.  Five years ago, nobody could
do a good insect; there's been real progress.  Brooks, Beer, and Travis
all have workable appraoches to engineering insects, and Maes and others
are now evolving insect-level nervous systems, if for rather dumb
insects.

       I happen to think that the way to the next step is to target the
mastery of inertia, of controlling a body massive enough that just
banging into the environment isn't good enough.  Others have other directions.
A good lizard would be a significant development.  If we're lucky, we may
see one by the end of the decade.

       Moving up to the low end mammals is the next step.  Once we
can make a mouse, we will be closer to human-level and beyond than
we currently are to a mouse.  This is not an idle speculation; from the
usual measurements of biological similarity (DNA distance, time to evolve,
and similarity of brain anatomy), all the mammals are more similar than
than mammals and non-mammals.

					John Nagle


