Can a computer be as intelligent as a human?
IBM has unveiled new experimental brain-inspired chips that are able to learn based on experience.
Back in February, an artificial intelligence (AI) computer called Watson appeared on Jeopardy! to demonstrate its capabilities. Watson was developed by IBM who describes him/it as follows:
Watson is a workload optimized system designed for complex analytics, made possible by integrating massively parallel POWER7 processors and the IBM DeepQA software to answer Jeopardy! questions in under three seconds. Watson is made up of a cluster of ninety IBM Power 750 servers (plus additional I/O, network and cluster controller nodes in 10 racks) with a total of 2880 POWER7 processor cores and 16 Terabytes of RAM. Each Power 750 server uses a 3.5 GHz POWER7 eight core processor, with four threads per core. The POWER7 processor’s massively parallel processing capability is an ideal match for Watson’s IBM DeepQA software which is embarrassingly parallel (that is a workload that is easily split up into multiple parallel tasks).
Watson competed against 74-time champion Ken Jennings and $3.3 million-winning Brad Rutter. Watson kicked their butts scoring $77,147 compared to $24,000 for Jennings and $21,600 for Rutter.
Now, IBM has unveiled new experimental brain-inspired chips that are able to learn based on experience. From the press release:
Today, IBM researchers unveiled a new generation of experimental computer chips designed to emulate the brain’s abilities for perception, action and cognition. The technology could yield many orders of magnitude less power consumption and space than used in today’s computers. In a sharp departure from traditional concepts in designing and building computers, IBM’s first neurosynaptic computing chips recreate the phenomena between spiking neurons and synapses in biological systems, such as the brain, through advanced algorithms and silicon circuitry. Its first two prototype chips have already been fabricated and are currently undergoing testing. Called cognitive computers, systems built with these chips won’t be programmed the same way traditional computers are today. Rather, cognitive computers are expected to learn through experiences, find correlations, create hypotheses, and remember – and learn from – the outcomes, mimicking the brains structural and synaptic plasticity.
The press release also outlines the possible uses of such chips:
Future chips will be able to ingest information from complex, real-world environments through multiple sensory modes and act through multiple motor modes in a coordinated, context-dependent manner. For example, a cognitive computing system monitoring the world’s water supply could contain a network of sensors and actuators that constantly record and report metrics such as temperature, pressure, wave height, acoustics and ocean tide, and issue tsunami warnings based on its decision making. Similarly, a grocer stocking shelves could use an instrumented glove that monitors sights, smells, texture and temperature to flag bad or contaminated produce. Making sense of real-time input flowing at an ever-dizzying rate would be a Herculean task for today’s computers, but would be natural for a brain-inspired system.
The question many people will ask is whether advances such as this mean we’re at the point where computers will soon be smarter than humans – whether AI will be able to outperform real, biological intelligence. I don’t think so. The fact is that we don’t understand intelligence at all. As discussed in a Big Think article by Max Miller, we don’t understand the biological process behind it and cannot even satisfactorily define it. What sets an Einstein apart from the rest of us? We really have no clue. And if we don’t understand how intelligence works, then how the heck can we possibly create artificial intelligence?
Inevitably, computers will become ever better at processing information but, no matter how you define it, that’s a very long way from real intelligence.
What do you think? Will man soon play second fiddle to machine? Leave a comment and share your thoughts.
No, machines are not intelligent they are programmed to process in a certain way even if they are capable of observation, the machine will be limited. Machines are great at helping us solve complex problems quickly. I have read several papers regarding Watson and was watching the IBMers tweaking Watson as the show progressed, after the show we talked at length about linear core processing and that instantaneous chemical firing of the brain the holy grail of the computing arena. Nuance also plays a significant role in our daily interactions, facial expression, olfactory senses all play a role in recall and memory.
One of my hobby studies is neural plasticity. Those who are far more adept in this field do not understand how the brain works to a great degree. The human brain and even the brain of lower animals are extremely complex. We do not have the ability to fully map and understand the electrical and chemical interactions. Mapping is going on in several key universities around the world and like the machines; we have a very long way to go before we exhaust the human brain project.
Appreciate the effort. Nevertheless, we don’t have to accomplish 80% of what you list to achieve human intelligence. The article title should be a little more specific with regards to metric.
I drove public transit for 42 years and saw a lot dumb stupid people behind the wheel. So I say yes.
Correct.
This latest development from Big Blue clearly represents a significant step forward in the development of A.I. most importantly in their software which is the actual intelligence. While it is true our knowledge and understanding of human intelligence is somewhat limited there is much we do know through experimentation and observation. To be able to mimic the parts we do understand is a remarkable milestone indeed. We now have circuits that analyses input within context and then uses the resulting knowledge in making a decision.Given the human track record of advancement through science it’s hard to believe we’ll never understand the full story of our intelligence with an artificial reproduction not far behind.
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[...] chips that behave like brains [Telegraph-Herald (Dubuque, IA)]TMC NetTheNewsTribune.com -Sync (blog)all 29 news articles » This entry was posted in Computer by admin. Bookmark [...]
Yikes! And the moral ramifications of this are…????
The “human brain” is nothing more than a biological computer, in time this will come to light.Who made ours is the real question.
The brain is the [organic] hardware of the soul. [i.e. thoughts and feelings are not in space and time, which explains why we really know nothing about intelligence itself from stuying the hardware that it uses.] A computer is the [inorganic] hardware of a database, nothing more. In short Watson may win at jeopardy answering every question about shakespearean characters in less than three seconds. The real question is “Could Watson write “King Lear”? The answer is and always will be “Never”.
never say never.
@Dave “..thoughts and feelings are not in space and time..”
Where do you think thoughts and feelings exist if not in space and time. That is a pretty wild speculation.
Usually what people don’t understand well, they attribute to “magic”.
Caprica showed the possibility of downloading what seems to be the soul of a person into a cpu to create the first cylon and others shows and movies showed it as a transferance of a type of software.
Possible this sentience can happen in AI whether it has a soul or not due to pure ai neural net might to create this effect.
It might take thousands of cores of this new chipset to even get close this what if?
Once we start using organic brain metter in computers, using perhaps stem cells to grow them or donated brain matter, along with a “life support system” for it, we will be well on the road to “thinking machines”, that truely do think.
there are experiments underway now that are working towards that direction, rather than using a “silicone based” chip.
This is where Asimov’s three laws come into the picture.
It is inevitable. if you look at the logarythmic advancement of computers and computing – it is inevitable even though many don’t want to believe it.
Artificial intelligence like “The Matrix” or “Terminator” isn’t really an immediate or even possible threat. But the ability to create systems that can do things at random could be problematic. As long as we don’t have total control over what we do, there will always be a problem.
We should only worry if something like the AI from Terminator or Portal fame come to fruition.
i wouldn’t worry we can only make a computer as smart as people and we still haven’t done that to a full extent because we cant its simply impossible to create a computer cable of annexing the earth on its own
[...] is doing more amazing stuff. First, props to Rhonda Callow for bringing up this socio-technological issue. It’s extremely relevant and timely and merits [...]
Hello Ms. Callow – with all due respect, I submit a response/rebuttal to your piece: http://goo.gl/2QNij. I hope you enjoy!
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The Wrong Question.
After mentioning Watson, this year’s non-human Jeopardy! champion, the author also details IBM’s newest experimental brain-like chip that learns and does massively parallel processing stuff like the human brain. So then we have the question, which is the article’s title, but I think that, maybe without realizing it, what the author really means to posit here is: Can a computer be intelligent like a human?
And the real answer to the whole AI/NBI question is: It doesn’t have to be.
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