Achieving a scientific discovery has been the sole domain of humans for quite some time. However, artificial intelligence is starting to catch up. Enter “Adam” an artificially intelligent robot with the tools to analyze biological data, formulate a novel hypothesis about that data, derive a set of tests to verify the hypothesis and then carry out those tests, and present conclusions from the data!

Adam’s repeated experiments resulted in the system identifying a few unknown genes in baker’s yeast that work together to form an orphan enzyme, this relationship was not previously known and Adam independently identified it.

Tools like this can allow human researchers to think at even higher levels, theorizing about broad spectrum experiments and leaving the systems to explore the frontier for them.

We have talked about the turing test before, now it appears the US Army wants to give it a shot in World of Warcraft. Along with several other advanced technologies like regenerating body parts, erasing bad memories, and electronic telepathy they are attempting to develop virtual soldiers that look and behave like a real human.

To test these virtual humans they are going to deploy them in World of Warcraft. The virtual soldiers should be able to convince humans they are real, going as far as emulating emotion and using local slang correctly while responding to questions and communicating effectively with other players.

It appears the Army is attempting to tackle some very complex AI and Nanotechnological problems. If one of their AI soldiers does manage to fit in properly in World of Warcraft, how far off is it from passing a full Turing Test? Does it have full understanding and is able to relay tactical situation information back or does it just manage to fit in without any higher awareness of its situation?

They may be biting off more than they can chew, however the Army/DoD have been responsible for several massive technological advances. Anyone ever hear of this thing called the internet?

What is the Singularity? Ever hear of Moore’s Law?

If you are reading this blog you probably have. Moore’s Law is an informal law about technological advancement. In a nutshell it states, that every 18 months or so, the power of computers doubles. Computer power has been following this trend for 40 years and it is set to continue following it for another 40 years. The idea of the singularity is, if technology does indeed continue to double at this rate, in another 40 or 50 years the sheer power of the computing systems available will so far surpass mankinds abilities that the formation of an artificial mega intelligence will be impossible to avoid and it will be a new age of evolution. Of course, this new age could go the way of Terminator or we could essentially all become godlike through unimaginable advances in AI, computing power and Nanotechnology. A lot of pieces need to fall into place for it to happen but many people are starting to think it is inevitable.

Don’t agree? Intel thinks the Singularity is a real possibility. Don’t think computers will ever really get that powerful? How about a super computer for your desktop by Cray? While Cray hasn’t released performance specs for this system it is bound to be more powerful than their first super computer. In fact, your common desktop today is roughly two hundred times faster than the first Cray. While this computer still cannot model the entire human brain that doesn’t mean anyone isn’t going to try. IBM’s Blue Brain project plans to model the human brain in its entirety in the next ten years. Is that enough to form a mega intelligence and bring about the singularity? Probably not, but it is getting closer.

The 2008 Singularity Summit is happening this friday. Some of the worlds greatest minds in AI, Nanotechnology, Innovation, and The Singularity will be there. Who knows what interesting ideas will be shared at the conference this year. Typically video’s of the conferences talks are available after the conference for anyone who is interested.

We can’t know for certain what the future holds, like I said, a lot of pieces need to fall into place for the singularity to happen. Will Nanotechnology advance the fastest and allow us to transform humans into fully cybernetic entities thus creating mega intelligent computer systems out of our own consciousnes? Will computers advance to a point where we create true AI? This AI would have access to our vast stores of knowledge, it would have the ability to instantly learn and integrate new knowlege and then could develop new theories based on that knowledge. It would be able to optimize itself, and duplicate itself creating more and more AI’s. These new AI’s could allow the advancement of Nanotechnology to the point where we could join them in their electronic virtual playground if we so chose to. Or maybe neither will happen, due to economic and political stresses. We just don’t know.

I for one welcome our future mega-intelligent overloards.

Next sunday there will be a fun little challenge happing at the University of Reading. Several computer programs will be competing to pass the ‘Turing test’.

To explain it simply, the Turing test, is an experiment to test a computers intelligence by having it attempt to fool a human into believeing it is human as well. A human judge faces off against a computer program and a human pretending to be the same program simultaneously. If the judge cannot tell which conversation is the human and which is the program, the program will have passed the Turing test.

Some people will definitely argue that the program doesn’t understand what it is saying, it is simply following rules to respond to the questions posed to it, and it does not represent intelligence. Well, don’t you as a human really just do the same thing, but with a considerably more complex and dynamic ruleset?

If the example conversation in this article is representative of all the programs competeing then they have a long way to go before they fool a human.