Since the advent of civilization, humans have been trying to simplify the everyday tasks. During those days, domestication of animals for farming was a big achievement. As society developed, there began segregation of tasks. People were specialized to perform specific activities. For a period of about two thousand years before Christ, religion started taking shape. There was further differentiation of roles. During the industrial revolution 'automation' came into picture. Machines started taking over the tedious tasks that were earlier performed manually. 'Faster and accurate' was the mantra of modern machines.
This quest for automated/intelligent systems continues unabated even today. This desire to innovate and develop intelligent machines is reflected in myriad of ways. Take movies for instance. Who can forget C-3PO and R2D2 from star wars. Or the intricate mesh of 'Matrix'. Imaginations of movie directors like George Lucas and science fiction authors like Asimov & Arthur C Clark have fuelled the desire for developing such intelligent systems.
Computers have brought about a juggernaut change in the last 30-40 years. They have been pivotal in shaping the current digital landscape. Developments in AI, NN, GA have found a well-suited platform in terms of computational brawn. Development of faster and faster chips has created the new digital economy.
We're in the middle of an inflection point. The chip manufacturers have realized that the maddening pace of increasing processor speeds cannot continue forever. In the last few years, we have seen a shift from a faster processor to a multitasking processor - call it Hyperthreading, or Dual-Core. Our current Xboxes and PS2s are powered by multiple cores, some companies call it Cells. All this is a shift in focus - from speed to throughput. But then this approach also has its limits. We could have a 1024 core system running an astounding number of applications in parallel. What then? All we did was create a mainframe/grid-computer of the size of a laptop. I agree that this is great for multitasking. But is it great in terms of its ability to think?
In my opinion, the human brain is unparalleled in its ability to understand, think and analyze. It's a product of thousands of years of evolution. Using the grey matter that lies within would be the key to unravel new dimensions of 'naturally synthesized' intelligence. A baby step in this regard has been taken at the University of Florida (link).
This neuron culture could have immense applications in diverse fields - many of them can not yet be comprehended. Exiting times have just started!
Hi Div, nice blog. thanks for dropping by mine. Yep, i do love movies. This was an interesting write-up- gets you thinking. WE humans share a fairly common impression about the word 'PERFECTION' and this has its effects on everything we do and make. Basically, its the opposite of everything we perseve as not-up-to-the-mark in us... it will include the whims and fancies of ... bosses who want 'perfect' subordinates- meaning ones who dont have the intelligence to question or give better ideas than his, daughter-in-laws praying for the 'perfect' astra that will free them from their MIL's fav torture tools...:)) The beautiful irony lies in the truth that all our technological advancements tending towards perfection are made by the clumsy imperfect HUMANS. We are perfectly imperfect :))... remember the movie 'AI'?! making a program work the way we want it to, is easy. try makin one that should find its own best way of doing work- boy is that gonna be some thrilling work to do. perhaps then we will finally understand that our picture of what is 'perfect' has a threshold point. :)) look at whos talking?!! software enggs!!!:))
We should be lucky we're software engineers. My CS teacher from school used to say - With time the software users would get dumber and dumber while the developers get smarter and smarter :)
totally agree here...exciting times are ahead!