Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

What is AI? Everything to know about artificial intelligence
zdnet.com ^ | Maria Diaz

Posted on 05/03/2023 5:50:10 AM PDT by RoosterRedux

If you want to know about the fascinating and fast-developing technologies of artificial intelligence, we cover everything from machine learning and general AI to neural networks.

*snip*

Artificial intelligence can be divided into three widely accepted subcategories: narrow AI, general AI, and super AI.

What is narrow AI?

Artificial narrow intelligence (ANI) is crucial to voice assistants, such as Siri, Alexa, and Google Assistant. This category includes intelligent systems that have been designed or trained to carry out specific tasks or solve particular problems, without being explicitly designed to do so.

ANI might often be referred to as weak AI, as it doesn't possess general intelligence, but some examples of the power of narrow AI include the above voice assistants, and also image-recognition systems, technologies that respond to simple customer service requests, and tools that flag inappropriate content online.

ChatGPT is an example of ANI, as it is programmed to perform a specific task, which is to generate text responses to the prompts it is given.

What is general AI?

Artificial general intelligence (AGI), also known as strong AI, is still a hypothetical concept as it involves a machine understanding and performing vastly different tasks based on its accumulated experience. This type of intelligence is more on the level of human intellect, as AGI systems would be able to reason and think like a human.

Like a human, AGI would potentially be able to understand any intellectual task, think abstractly, learn from its experiences, and use that knowledge to solve new problems. Essentially, we're talking about a system or machine capable of common sense, which is currently not achievable with any form of available AI.

Developing a system with its own consciousness is still, presumably, a fair way in the distance, but it is the ultimate goal in AI research.

*snip*

What are large language models? One of the most renowned types of AI right now are large language models (LLM). These models use unsupervised machine learning and are trained on massive amounts of text to learn how human language works. These texts include articles, books, websites, and more.

In the training process, LLMs process billions of words and phrases to learn patterns and relationships between them, making the models able to generate human-like answers to prompts.

The most popular LLM is GPT 3.5, on which ChatGPT is based, and the largest LLM is GPT-4. Bard uses LaMDA, a LLM developed by Google, which is the second-largest LLM.

What is deep learning?

Part of the machine-learning family, deep learning involves training artificial neural networks with three or more layers to perform different tasks. These neural networks are expanded into sprawling networks with a large number of deep layers that are trained using massive amounts of data.

Deep-learning models tend to have more than three layers, and can have hundreds of layers. It can use supervised or unsupervised learning or a combination of both in the training process.

Because deep-learning technology can learn to recognize complex patterns in data using AI, it is often used in natural language processing (NLP), speech recognition, and image recognition.

What are neural networks?

The success of machine learning relies on neural networks. These are mathematical models whose structure and functioning are loosely based on the connection between neurons in the human brain, mimicking the way they signal to one another.

Imagine a group of robots that are working together to solve a puzzle. Each one is programmed to recognize a different shape or color in the puzzle pieces. The robots combine their abilities to solve the puzzle together. A neural network is like the group of robots.

Neural networks can tweak internal parameters to change what they output. Each one is fed databases to learn what it should put out when presented with certain data during training.

They are made up of interconnected layers of algorithms that feed data into each other. Neural networks can be trained to carry out specific tasks by modifying the importance attributed to data as it passes between layers. During the training of these neural networks, the weights attached to data as it passes between layers will continue to be varied until the output from the neural network is very close to what is desired.

At that point, the network will have 'learned' how to carry out a particular task. The desired output could be anything from correctly labelling fruit in an image to predicting when an elevator might fail based on its sensor data.

What is conversational AI?

Conversational AI includes systems that are programmed to have conversations with a user: trained to listen (input), and respond (output) in a conversational manner. Conversational AI uses natural language processing to understand and respond in a natural way.

Some examples of conversational AI are chatbots like Google Bard, smart speakers with a voice assistant like Amazon Alexa, or virtual assistants on your smartphone like Siri.

Which AI services are available to use?

General consumers and businesses alike have a wealth of AI services available to expedite tasks and add convenience to day-to-day life -- you probably have something in your home that uses AI in some capacity.

Here are some common examples of artificial intelligence available to the public, both free and for a fee:

Voice assistants: Amazon Alexa sitting in that Echo device on your shelf or Apple's Siri in your iPhone and Google Assistant all use natural language processing to understand and respond to your questions or commands. Chatbots: AI chatbots are another form of virtual assistants that can interact with people and, in some cases, hold human-like conversations, even mimicking empathy and concern.

Language translation: Machine learning reaches far and wide, and services like Google Translate, Microsoft Translator, Amazon Translate, and ChatGPT all use it to translate text.

Productivity: Microsoft 365 Copilot is a great example of a LLM used as an AI productivity tool, embedded within Word, PowerPoint, Outlook, Excel, Teams, and more to automate tasks for you. Simply asking, 'email the team about the latest status on the project' will trigger Copilot to automatically gather information from emails and documents to generate a text with what you asked. Image and video recognition: Different programs use AI to find information about the content in images and videos, such as the faces, text, and objects within them. Clarifai, which employs machine learning to organize unstructured data from sources, and Amazon Rekognition, an AWS service that lets users upload images to receive information, are two examples of this.

Software development: Many developers have started using ChatGPT to write and debug code, but there are many other AI tools available to make a programmer's job easier. One example, the AI pair programmer GitHub Copilot by OpenAI Codex, is a generative language model that can write code faster with less effort by autocompleting comments and code instantly.

Building a business: Aside from an everyday user availing themselves of artificial intelligence around them, there are services offering AI tools for businesses, including OpenAI's GPT-4 API (currently on waitlist) to built applications and services using the LLM; or Amazon Bedrock, a suite of cloud-based AI tools for developers.

(Excerpt) Read more at zdnet.com ...


TOPICS: News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: ai
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-2021-28 last
To: RoosterRedux

so-called AI such as ChatGPT are simply search engines that comb wiki, lexisnexis and a plethora of public internet sources and regurgitate what they find ... since 99% of such sources are grossly biased to the left, search AI regurgitates leftist tropes ... this is all just another form of garbage-in-garbage-out ...

true AI would create and invent inventions and mathematics and concepts unthought of by human intelligence ...


21 posted on 05/03/2023 9:12:58 AM PDT by catnipman (In a post-covid world, ALL "science" is now political science: stolen elections have consequences)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: catnipman
Have you tried ChatGPT?

If you ask the right questions, it's quite remarkable. I have used it in writing some VBA routines for Excel for analyzing stocks and markets and it has allowed me to do in a few hours what used to take me a few weeks.

22 posted on 05/03/2023 10:04:15 AM PDT by RoosterRedux (Bonhoeffer: “Silence in the face of evil is evil. Not to speak is to speak. Not to act is to act.”)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 21 | View Replies]

To: RoosterRedux

“I have used it in writing some VBA routines for Excel for analyzing stocks and markets and it has allowed me to do in a few hours what used to take me a few weeks.”

interesting ...


23 posted on 05/03/2023 10:15:08 AM PDT by catnipman (In a post-covid world, ALL "science" is now political science: stolen elections have consequences)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 22 | View Replies]

To: RoosterRedux

My friends and I do not think AI is dangerous at all
Blnk
24 posted on 05/03/2023 3:45:58 PM PDT by minnesota_bound (Need more money to buy everything now)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: minnesota_bound
I watched a podcast yesterday (HERE: "The A.I. Dilemma - March 9, 2023") where it was said that in recent survey of scientists working on AI, 50% of such scientists said that there was a 10% chance that AI will lead to the extinction of human beings.
25 posted on 05/03/2023 3:56:00 PM PDT by RoosterRedux (Bonhoeffer: “Silence in the face of evil is evil. Not to speak is to speak. Not to act is to act.”)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 24 | View Replies]

To: RoosterRedux

I speculate that there are two main groups who are worried about AI: materialists and spiritualists.

Materialists explain the mind in purely material terms and so they logically suppose that it would be possible to build a machine with actual consciousness. This group is heavily comprised of agnostics and atheists and therefore leftists.

Then on the other end are the spiritualists, who think complex electronic systems can become imbued with demonic influence. They tend to be religious people, a large slice of whom envision large scale AI playing a role in the control systems of a satanic future world government.

In this pattern there is the potential for convergence across the ideological spectrum similar to what you might see in, say, fears about the food supply. Left-wingers have deep worries about big corporate players like Monsanto poisoning the world with their GMO crops. And on the right similar views animate the patriotic prepper and back-to-basics crowds.

This “consensus of worry” may create an unusually high demand for government oversight over AI resulting in a high level of curbing legislation and regulatory action, plus a generally high level of societal attention paid to the issue.

And of course those Terminator movies have got SkyNet in the back of everybody’s minds too lol. We probably have prime conditions for a bumper crop of dystopian AI themed screenplays sweeping through Hollywood and deluging us with Terminator reboots and knockoffs in the near future...


26 posted on 05/09/2023 7:11:11 AM PDT by Yardstick
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 25 | View Replies]

To: Yardstick
Interesting comment.

When you mention government oversight, I naturally get nervous.

Can you imagine anything good coming from government involvement with something as potentially life-altering as AI?

27 posted on 05/09/2023 7:19:39 AM PDT by RoosterRedux (Bonhoeffer: “Silence in the face of evil is evil. Not to speak is to speak. Not to act is to act.”)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 26 | View Replies]

To: RoosterRedux

Well the government is great at screwing things up but I suspect that once AI is out of the bottle, the government isn’t going to be able to do much about it. I also think AI is much less of a threat than some people foresee it to be, precisely because it can never be truly intelligent IMO. It will never possess intentionality and creativity and therefore will never be more than a tool, which means that any risks that it poses won’t amount to a profound new kind of evil but rather just a new facet of the old, standard evil, which is to say human nature.


28 posted on 05/09/2023 8:39:53 AM PDT by Yardstick
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 27 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-2021-28 last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson