The short answer to What is Artificial Intelligence really is that it relies heavily on who you ask. A layperson with even a fleeting knowledge of artificial intelligence would probably link it to artificially intelligent robotic machines. They also say that Artificial Intelligence is a super terminator like-figurative machine that can think and act on its own. These are the two most popular and common answers to the question of what is artificial intelligence. While these answers do describe the way intelligence works, they fail to answer some fundamental questions about intelligence.
AI stands for artificial intelligence, which is the study or application of software that mimics human capabilities. It is often used to refer to computers that can beat games or humans who can beat games. Deep Blue, a computer of human intelligence defeated the world chess champion, Kasparov, in 2021. Deep Blue was a system created by scientists using software designed to simulate the thinking process of a human grandmaster. This was one of the first cases where artificial intelligence was used to beat someone who knew the game of chess.
However, these examples are just the tip of the iceberg. Nowadays artificial intelligence is used in all aspects of human endeavor, from software that can beat a casino in online poker tournaments to military programs which can anticipate how a nation’s military maneuvers will evolve over time. In fact artificial intelligence systems are now being utilized as educational tools. Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University have been using AI techniques to teach Artificial Intelligent systems to create new images and animations.
The interesting thing about this is how AIs are able to remember things and make connections even between unrelated data. This is similar to how humans think. Humans can only remember things that they have already visually seen or heard, whereas a computer will retain anything it has been exposed to which contains relevant keywords. It also seems that these AIs will make connections that other machines cannot.
This may give us insight into what human machines will look like in the future. Perhaps the very first artificially intelligent machines will not resemble humans at all. Instead they will be indistinguishable from them thanks to their ability to understand human language. These machines may use facial recognition to scan faces in grocery stores and allow its users to choose what items they wish to buy. Or they may follow a customer around the store and keep track of their personal preferences while they shop.
Deep Learning has made incredible leaps and bounds forward thanks in large part to the work of Yann LeCoultre and others in the field of artificial intelligence. If you haven’t taken a look at what AIs are capable of today, you should definitely do so. The future really does look as bright as it looks today thanks in large part to the work being done by machine learning researchers right now.
