Robots Unlimited: Life in a Virtual Age

442 Pages·2005·4.397 MB·English

by  David Levy

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Robots Unlimited
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Robots Unlimited
Life in a Virtual Age
David Levy

AKPeters,Ltd.
Wellesley,Massachusetts
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Editorial,Sales,andCustomerServiceOffice
AKPeters,Ltd.
888WorcesterStreet,Suite230
Wellesley,MA02482
www.akpeters.com
Copyright©2006byAKPeters,Ltd.
All rights reserved. No part of the material protected by this copyright
notice may be reproduced or utilized in any form, electronic or me-
chanical,includingphotocopying,recording,orbyanyinformationstor-
ageandretrievalsystem,withoutwrittenpermissionfromthecopyright
owner.
LibraryofCongressCataloging-in-PublicationData
Levy,DavidN.L.
Robotsunlimited:lifeinavirtualage/DavidLevy.
p.cm.
Includesbibliographicalreferencesandindex.
ISBN1-56881-239-6
1.Robotics–History.I.Title.
TJ211.L456 2005
629.8’92–dc22
2005045869

PrintedinIndia
09080706 10987654321
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ForDonald,whohasmadesomanythingspossible.

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Contents
Preface xi
Acknowledgments xv
PartI AnEarlyHistoryofArtificialIntelligence 1
1 EarlyHistory—Logic,GamesandSpeech 3
EarlyLogicMachines . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
ElectricalLogicMachines . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
EarlyGamesMachines . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
KonradZuseandtheFirstComputer . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
MechanicalSpeechSynthesis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
ElectricalSpeechSynthesis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
SpeechRecognition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
2 EarlyHistory—Robots,Thought,Creativity,Learning
andTranslation 35
RobotTortoises . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
AlanTuring . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
Creativity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
MachineLearning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
MachineTranslation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
The1956DartmouthWorkshop . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64
PartII FiftyYearsofProgress 69
3 HowComputersPlayGames 71
Chess . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
Checkers(Draughts) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89
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Contents
UsingDatabasestoSolveOtherGames . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
Go—TheMostDifficultGameofAll . . . . . . . . . . . . 94
PlayingMetagames—ProgramsthatLearntoPlayfrom
theRules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
GameswithImperfectInformationandGames
withChance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100
4 HowComputersRecognize 115
VisualRecognition—HowComputersSee . . . . . . . . . . 115
SomeApplicationsofComputerVision . . . . . . . . . . . 125
SpeechRecognition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 134
TasteRecognition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138
SmellRecognition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140
TheRecognitionofCreativeStyle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141
5 CreativeComputers 149
HowComputersWritePoetry . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152
HowComputersWriteFiction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155
HowComputersWriteNon-Fiction . . . . . . . . . . . . . 163
HowComputersComposeMusic . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 165
HowComputersCreateVisualArt . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 175
6 HowComputersThink 187
WhatisLogic? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 188
LogicalReasoning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 189
ProblemSolving . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 193
Planning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 200
CommonsenseReasoning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 205
CaseBasedReasoning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 208
HowComputersLearn . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 211
HowComputersDiscoverandInvent . . . . . . . . . . . . 224
KnowledgeDiscovery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 232
ExpertSystems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 234
7 HowComputersCommunicate 245
NaturalLanguageProcessing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 245
Text-to-SpeechSynthesis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 262
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8 ThingstoDoforRobots 267
RobotSoccer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 267
ARobotSportsMiscellany . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 270
TheRobotChauffeur . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 274
UrbanSearch-and-RescueRobots . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 276
RobotSurgeons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 278
Gastrobots . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 280
DomesticRobots . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 282
TheRobotGrandChallenge . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 286
HumanoidRobots . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 289
PartIII TheNextFiftyYears 293
9 TheExponentialGrowthofScientificAchievements 295
WhatIsExponentialGrowth? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 296
Moore’sLawofComputingPower . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 297
TheOpticalComputer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 298
TheDNAComputer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 301
TheMolecularComputer(Nano-Machines) . . . . . . . . . 303
TheQuantumComputer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 304
ComputerMemory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 305
TheKnowledgeExplosion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 306
SomeViewsoftheFuture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 309
Super-Robots . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 314
10 EmotionandLove,AIStyle 315
FunctionsofEmotion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 316
PsychologicalTheoriesofEmotion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 316
FeelingEmotionsforOthers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 317
HumansFeelingAffectionforRobots—TheTamagotchi . . . 318
FiveCriteriaforEmotions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 320
ModelsofEmotioninRobots . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 321
Empathy—HowRobotsRecognizeandMeasure
EmotionsinHumans . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 327
MindReading . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 329
HowRobotsExpressEmotion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 334
RobotPersonality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 336
LoveandMarriagewithRobots—AnAcceptableIdea? . . . . 339
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11 SexandReproduction,AIStyle 347
SexwithRobots . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 347
IntelligentSexMachines . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 348
ExperimentswithSexbots . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 350
TheMechanicsofSexwithRobots . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 351
WhenCanIBuyOne? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 352
DominicChoy’sPatentApplication . . . . . . . . . . . . . 353
RobotReproduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 356
RobotEvolution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 365
RobotOffspring,withaDashofHumanAdded . . . . . . . 366
12 RobotConsciousness 369
WhatIsConsciousness? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 369
CanRobotsHaveConsciousness? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 372
RobotFeelings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 379
RobotHopesandWishes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 381
CanRobotsHaveBeliefs? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 382
RobotDreams . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 383
CanRobotsHaveFreeWill? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 383
TheReligiousLifeofRobots . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 385
13 RobotRightsandEthics 393
TheRightsofRobots . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 393
RobotEthics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 399
Bibliography 425
Index 439

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Preface
Thisbookisforeveryoneinterestedinthefuture. Althoughitssub-
jectmatter,ArtificialIntelligence,isoneofthemostavant-garde
and exciting of sciences, you do not need any prior technical or
scientificknowledgeinordertounderstandwhatiswrittenhere. Nordo
you need to know how computers work or how they are programmed.
Everything is explained in easy-to-follow language. So any of you who
consideryourselvestechnophobesshouldhaveabsolutelynofearofdelv-
ingfurtherintothesepages.
The first problem facing the author of any comprehensive book on
AIisthesurprisinglyenormousbreadthofthefield,including,asitdoes,
programs that play games, compose music and perform other creative
tasks, programs that reason and learn. There are even programs and ro-
bots that exhibit emotions and can reproduce. A huge mass of source
material exists on almost every topic within the field of AI, material
which ranges in the depth of its coverage from the “relatively elemen-
tary” (which, in AI, tends to mean something written at a level suitable
for first–year computer science students) to the detailed and technically
advanced papers published in conference proceedings and learned jour-
nalsandintendedforhigherlevelacademicsandresearchscientists. Had
IbeenabletoincludeallthematerialthatIwished,thisbookwouldhave
extendedtoaseriesofseveralvolumes,eachofasimilarsizetothisone.
Instead I had to find a way, within this single tome, to convey not only
thebreadthofideasandinventionswithinAI,butalsotheprogressthat
has been made since 1955 when the field was conceived as a research
subject in its own right,1 and to explain the inevitable advances of the
comingdecades.
1Manysourcesgive1956astheyearinwhichArtificialIntelligencewasconceived,thatbeingthe
yearoftheDartmouthworkshopwhereJohnMcCarthy’snameforthesubjectwasaffixed. Infact
thename“ArtificialIntelligence”wascoinedbyMcCarthyintheproposalforfundingtheworkshop,
adocumentpreparedandsubmittedin1955.Ithereforeregard1955astheyearoftheconception
ofAIand1956astheyearofitsbirth.
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Preface
Even after I had decided on my choice of source material, a choice
that often had to be fairly ruthless in its selectivity, my source papers
forthisbookstillcomprisedsome5,000printedandphotocopiedpages.
Fromalltheseitwasnecessarytodistiltheessenceofeachtopic,whileat
thesametimepresentingthewholesubjectofAIinawaythatcouldbe
understoodbyall,withouttheneedforanypreviousComputerScience,
Artificial Intelligence or other technical education or knowledge. The
necessity of restricting the length of this work to “only” 450 pages or
thereabouts, with all this source material sitting on my shelves, forced
me to think about what would be really important in getting across
to my readers the essence, excitement and potential of Artificial Intel-
ligence. TheapproachIdecideduponwasthis. Inordertodescribethe
foundations of AI as they existed pre-1955, Chapters 1 and 2 present
an account of various artefacts dating back as far, believe it or not, as
1650,2 all of which represent artificial forms of some kind of intelli-
gence. These include methods for the composition of music, machines
that played games, machines that could solve simple problems in logic,
anddevicesfortranslatingfromonelanguagetoanother. Manyofthese
historical artefacts are remarkable for their anticipation of techniques
that reached some level of maturity as computer programs in the late
twentiethcentury.
Aftersettingthestageinthisway,thebookcontinueswithfivechap-
ters (Chapters 3–7) that divide up between them most of the exciting
and important topics within AI, demonstrating the progress made in
each of these domains during the 50 years spanning 1955 to 2004. In
general I have described these progressions by first recounting the ear-
liest computerized attempts within each topic,3 and then by present-
ing one or more state-of-the-art exemplars, demonstrating how much
progresshasbeenmadetodatewithineachdomain. Betweenthesetwo
stagesofresearch—theseminalattemptsandthecurrentstate-of-the-art

2Itwasin1650thatAthanasiusKircherpublisheddetailsofhismethodfortheautomaticcom-
positionofmusic(seeChapter5). IdonotregardRamonLlull’sideasonlogicinthethirteenth
century(seeChapter1)asbeingofcomparableimport,astheydidnotleaddirectlytoanyuseful
processorartifact.InsteadLlull’swritingsactedasacatalystforothers.Thereisalsoanotherclaim
madeastotheearliestartificiallyintelligentartefact.SomeresearcherssubscribetotheviewthatEu-
doxusandArchytas,inancientGreece,inventedsomesortofproofmachine.Thatattributionstems
fromapassageinPlutarch’sLifeofMarcelluswhich,infact,doesnotrefertoanysuchmachine,and
authoritativesourcessuchastheStanfordEncyclopaediaofPhilosophyarethereforedismissiveofthe
claim.
3Manyoftheseearlyeffortswerebasedonideasandtechniquesthatnotonlywereseminalfor
theirrespectivedomainsbutwhicharestillinusetoday.
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