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A.I. Isn’t as Advanced as You Think
A computer scientist argues that artificial intelligence is progressing more slowly than the hype suggests
Melanie Mitchell wrote her new book, Artificial Intelligence: A Guide for Thinking Humans, because she was confused about how much progress really is being made in A.I. She wanted “to understand the true state of affairs,” she writes.
It’s a relief to learn of her ambivalence because she is an artificial intelligence researcher herself. She’s a professor of computer science at Portland State University and co-chair of the science board at the Santa Fe Institute, a renowned multidisciplinary research center. If Mitchell could be perplexed about where A.I. stands, forgive the rest of us for being mystified or just plain wrong.
As Mitchell notes, a lot of triumphal A.I. narratives are floating around. In these accounts, recent breakthroughs in computer vision, speech recognition, game playing, and other aspects of machine learning are indications that artificial intelligence might surpass human competence in a wide range of tasks in the coming decades. Some people find that prospect marvelous; others worry that “superhuman” computers might decide they don’t need us around and have the power to do something about it.
“Either we are…
