jwzFeb 20, 2023

The best description I've ever heard of AI is the following. I heard this in the 80s, and it has held up since:

AI is magic.

1: You see a magic trick. You are amazed by the magic.

2: You are shown how the trick works. You are impressed by the technique.

3: You learn how to perform the trick. Now it's not magic, it's sleight-of-hand, or mirrors, or misdirection.

This is why "AI" is always bullshit: once you understand it, it's not AI any more, it's something else.

Show threadjwzFeb 20, 2023

Some things that used to be AI but aren't any more:

- production systems
- expert systems
- semantic networks
- theorem provers
- Bayesian inference
- putting parentheses around data and calling it "knowledge"
- computational linguistics
- genetic algorithms
- machine translation

Show threadMike MolFeb 20, 2023
@jwz To paraphrase Arthur C. Clark, any sufficiently advanced computational technology is [indistinguishable from] "AI".
Show thread8Feb 21, 2023
@mikemol @jwz to paraphrase Paul Simon, an agent (A) offering an exchange of familiar companionship for physical protection from another (B) also can be called "Al".
Show threadMike Mol
@Octarine @jwz I can call you DALLE, DALLE, you can call me, well, you can call me AI.
Feb 21, 2023 at 1:16amWeb