Chuck Shotton's Logic Faults
Things that make sense to me (and maybe only me).



Subscribe to "Chuck Shotton's Logic Faults" in Radio UserLand.

Click to see the XML version of this web page.

Click on the coffee mug to add Chuck Shotton's Instant Outline to your Radio UserLand buddy list.

Click here to send an email to the editor of this weblog.
 

 

Monday, October 21, 2002
 

Downloading The Mind [Slashdot]
Kurzweil figures we'll have strong AI by 2029 and be able to copy a human mind about a decade after that.

I've met Ray on several social occasions and discussed his vision for the future. There is a huge flaw (or blind spot) in his vision. All of his massive advances in AI and general computing functionality are based on extrapolating trends like Moore's Law, Metcalf's Law, etc. into the near future. He infers that because they predict that massive CPU power and network bandwidth will be available, that the software to match it will naturally come along, too. Ray's a hardware guy, for sure. Unfortunately, we've already seen a plateau in the demand for CPU cycles and network bandwidth. Without market forces to drive these trends, why assume they'll be sustained?

The problem with depending on hardware and network advances to drive his vision is that software engineering simply cannot keep up with the pace of advances on the hardware front. Anyone who has ever read the "Mythical Man Month" understands this at a basic level. Humans simply cannot organize themselves well enough to tackle software projects of the magnitude that Ray envisions, at least not by 2029.

Ray dismisses this argument by saying we'll have software that writes the software. Well, there's a tautology for you. If you can't write the software you need because it's too complicated, how can you possibly be expected to write the software to write that software? Genetic algorithms are useful for some very specific trial and error sorts of problems. But using them to random walk our way to a billion lines of debugged, functional AI code seems a bit of a stretch.

My money sure isn't on Ray's pony...
8:27:44 AM    comment [] 



Click here to visit the Radio UserLand website. © Copyright 2002 Chuck Shotton.
Last update: 11/4/02; 4:56:28 PM.
This theme is based on the SoundWaves (blue) Manila theme.
October 2002
Sun Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat
    1 2 3 4 5
6 7 8 9 10 11 12
13 14 15 16 17 18 19
20 21 22 23 24 25 26
27 28 29 30 31    
Sep   Nov