Believe those who are seeking the truth. Doubt those who find it.
Wednesday, February 16, 2011
MWF, 10am
23 comments:
Anonymous
said...
Animals should have rights as they are living things. We as humans do many inhumane things to animals, such as animal farms where animals are being tortured before they are slaughter and prepared for shipment. Monkeys are being experimented on. Chickens are in camps were they are over crowed and not feed. Cows are being stab and hang while they shank there throat. I know animals cant talk for them selves but it is up to us to do it for them. It is some what legal issue but its just being humane about going about how they kill the animals so that humans can eat.
Watson is a machine. It cannot think, it cannot feel, and it cannot create out of self creativeness. Even though this is being considered as a breakthrough, and I believe it to be, it has still not done enough to initiate amazement in me. Why? Well, I feel that the technology developed with Watson could have been developed before. Why? Well… inventions and breakthroughs such as Watson are, for the most part, funded by big corporations which do nothing but collect as much money as they can as a vampire would do to blood at a blood bank. What about those who have innovative ideas with grand potential but are left in the shadow because they don’t have a thirty billion brand name behind them. This, in my opinion, is a problem. Today, in this country, the greatest minds don’t necessarily go into science. They go into finance; they go to Wall Street. And the few who have great ideas but no budget have to worry about competing with others with also great ideas and low budgets. All I’m saying is that if people didn’t value certain things as much, like money, maybe then they could work together and achieve incredible feats. Instead they compete for the recognition and whenever a great idea wins, another one decays. This is capitalism. It may be thought to be the world’s best system, but I think it makes things like Watson seem incredible now, when it could have been seen as incredible before.
The whole Watson situation is somewhat laughable. I saw the week in which Jeopardy had the IBM machine playing against the 'professionals'. Honestly, it just seemed like a Google machine. Give an answer, find a question or statement that it relates to. Plagiarism? It seems that way. It's a system of inputs and outputs that we can do ourselves. Sure Watson is faster, but that is what computers were made to do in some context. It really amazes me that IBM feels the need to create Watson to accomplish further breakthroughs and accomplishments. Are we not becoming lazy? We need to spend at the least, millions of dollars and countless hours to make a MACHINE. In which it will do the work of finance, health care and the like for us. Now why could we not do that instead? The function of Watson is not like a human, nor that of an animal. I don't believe people should be anymore impressed with it (because IT is a THING), than when computers and new technology are released. I'm counting on the day when Watson or maybe Wanda (the next one in line perhaps?) comes out in different colors such as pink.
I believe that animals should have rights as they also form a part of the family we control in this ecosystem. To have legal action, and abolish slaughter houses would be absolutely insane. We have the same rights they have to eat what they are meant to eat and we are at the top of the food chain, it is not our option it is our position. My argument is you do not stop a lion from feeding on a zebra because it is unethical. If it is inhumane for us to eat them than I am afraid we have lost a sense of what is truly humane. I love animals, I have bred about 12 beautiful maltese's and I personally try to be a peaceful loving person; i would only kill an animal if it was my only option to eat and yes I would do it in a heartbeat. The amount of protein in our foods is essential to our diets. They are going to die anyway they are just cattle they might have feelings but you can't get all mushy if you wanna eat something that was alive if you don't like it go ahead and be a vegan i enjoy my meat.
The development in technology has raised many important questions over the years. It is an outstanding and smart choices of bring out new innovations in our world. It is also a very fascinating way to introduce the world to better mainframe. However, this advance in technology can’t compare to humans abilities in acquiring new knowledge. It is simply a programming thing that makes most of us stupid in some ways we lost the ability to think. I understand it is intelligent as it can be, but it will never surpass the human mind. I believe human beings will stay as the only and the smartest being on earth. I am not convince of this IBM’s huge impact in the world.
With the advancement of technology, everything seems possible. But where are these advances is heading? Is it for the better or for the worse? Technology has made us what we are today, the progress, the modern things we are all enjoying, from the simple to the most complicated machine we ever saw. The development in computer technology is going very fast and today's IBM wants to challenge the human mind. Watson is a supercomputer that won the most famous game show in the U.S., the Jeopardy. This is not the first time that IBM tested the effectiveness of human intelligence. The supercomputer Deep Blue beat the world chess master Garry Kasparov, and that was the first time the world realize that those silly machines with no intelligence were perhaps not as silly after all. In fact, IBM company invested in powerful systems of Watson; to claim that machines are now able to mimic the human brain. No matter what the human initiative, there seem to be times when a controversy over new computer advance arises. From norm to social values, and ideologies, technology is often seen as the beast which challenges all of the traditions of human beings. Between ethical dilemmas and future expectations, we can not deny is that computers are father every day. And with that, Who Wins? In the end we all come out winners, either with new equipment for health, innovations in the media or the way businesses are managed. Technology and the man always walk together towards prosperity. How computer eventually impacts human as a whole remains to be seen, however, if current trends continue, processing capacity and artificial intelligence will be more common in computer.
Meet Watson. He’s made up of 100 (total) IBM power 7-50 servers, has a memory capacity of 15 trillion bytes, learns by trial and error, and most importantly “knows what it knows, and knows what it doesn’t know.” Furthermore, “some of the world’s most brilliant minds have created this very impressive system.” As Watson shows off his skills on the Jeopardy game show, he proves that one does not have to have a brain to be intelligent. Does this mean Watson is more impressive than his human competitors? While Watson may share the same causal role as, let’s say, a physician assistant, what Watson lacks that a physician assistant doesn’t is l’espirit. Watson is merely a group of brilliant minds put together into one machine; therefore, Watson, in and of itself, can’t be impressive; it merely cheats off of the knowledge its creators pre-equipped it with. When it comes down to l’espirit, artificial intelligence/Watson/man-made machines are void and, therefore, can never be superior to humans. We can never be superior to God, He is our creator; the same way machines will never be superior to humans, we create them. Nonetheless, not only does Watson steal the credit of “the world’s most brilliant minds,” but it also stole my answer to the Daily Double!!
The function of Watson is pretty ridiculous to me really. I mean, really? Our society is truly going about this whole creation of “robots” and doing things for us in the wrong way. Why do we want a computer that is supposed to outsmart humans? This is really getting out of hand. Don’t get me wrong, the advancement of technology is mesmerizing. But it is also scaring me a little. In 30 years, where will we be? Will we all have super computers doing our homework for us? Will we have developed a robot to clean our house? I feel like even with the advancement we have with technology, we are also losing ourselves in the mix. We are more concerned with the development of a super computer that can think like a human. What’s the point in this? Why are we trying to compete with a computer? Clearly, the computer is going to win, especially if it’s a “super” computer. Our society is swaying in the wrong direction with this. We are creating devices that are becoming superior to humans. We are losing our touch with nature, becoming more concerned with the physical concepts of life, and this will ultimately become our demise. Is that what we want? Do we want to be overpowered? Well, whatever these scientists are doing, they are definitely creating a recipe for disaster.
Watson is an impressive accomplishment. It will definitely bring further advancement in our technology but where is this all going? We see how machines now perform factory work leaving people out jobs, would Watson be taking over hospitals as physician assistants? Technology has certainly made our lives easier but it does have its cons. We see less human contact, things are transitioning into automated actions. You place a phone call for customer service a machine answers and sometimes it seems more difficult speaking to it than a person. As technology advances I see how we become more and more dependent to electronics. If were not allowed to use a computer, cell phone or electronic device for a week, some would probably have some form of an anxiety attack. Watson is a great accomplishment for the technological world but will it be as beneficial as they say when it comes to dealing with humans? Hopefully it would benefit us and not add to our addiction of electronics.
Watson is pretty awesome. Looking back at the old episode of jeopardy when it first came out its a big improvement and definitely a breakthrough. What intrigued me the most is how it learns from trial and error. The ability to make a mistake and learn from that mistake is very fascinating. I don't believe however it to have a mind or even be anywhere close to that aspect, but i surely believe that in the near future the technological development will be much more advanced. It's kind of scary to think about. If a machine can learn from trial and error in the end there is no stopping it. It's intelligence must grow. And i don't ever believe a machine, as advanced as it can get, will ever have a mind, because even it it can and may know the physical properties of each feeling or emotions etc. it will never have the certain qualia of being a person and having a mind. Like Nagel's bats, Just because it knows what a mind is and every aspect of it, it will never have a mind therefor will never know what is it's like to have a mind.
Watson is a pretty big breakthrough in artificial intelligence that can understand human language. No lie, this wired creature does a better job at recognizing words than the current automated robots customer serve directories have. But, overall I don't believe machines like Watson can compare to human abilities. Watching the take on what Watson could do for healthcare doesn't amaze me at all. Just like doctors, Watson can make mistakes too. Watson could mistaken a stroke for a heart attack because of similar symptoms. Although yes it would narrow down the possibilities for a doctor or a nurse, it also takes away the art and makes them lazy in using their own cognitive abilities to diagnose a patient. I can see where it would work in certain aspects of healthcare like pharmacy (which already have computers doing part of their job like Lucy and Ricky at the VA Medical Center in Miami). I can see where it works in customer service (because he won't show the emotion of frustration…maybe). Watson is a smart computer. I can see where it would work, I see it learns through trial and error like us, but in the end, you still need a human to follow up.
Simply put, Watson has been an inevitable creation from computer science and is completely a necessary for the advancements for computer science and technology. Watson is not a Google machine, for being a machine articulately "designed" for a single purpose, answering and functioning that is all geared to jeopardy. No matter the heights of computer science, human's are still a necessary condition for computers to exist, without human's even the "smartest" computers cannot do without the aid of Human's. In fact, the Watson is in fact not a situation, but an applaudable and exciting achievement, to exemplify the knowledge that a mere thousands of silicon chips can do with the necessary programmers and computer scientists. Computers like these would be amazing in all work environments from medical fields to space. It would be substantial to afford a machine such as Watson all over the fields of education and human advancement, though we cannot 100% depend on a machine greater or equivalently this intelligent. To correct, Watson consists, of 750 servers enclosed in 10 racks, 16 Terabytes, 2880 cores, running on a Linux system. Any means, Watson brings us great excitement, a well worth computing feat.
Dinah said. To me Watson, is a big accomplishment for computer technology. His artificial intelligence has evolved greatly since his first game of Jeopardy. With all that memory, the internet wasn't even needed for any answers because he had all the answers in him saved the same way us humans use our prior knowledge. Watson in the future can help revolutionize the way everyday life is. It could be used to help doctors diagnose disease in patients or help make life easier for people who have a lot to do during the day. One more thing Watson can help do is work customer service lines on the phone. Its trouble shooting abilities can help identify the customers problems faster then the automated systems that are currently in place. On the contrary, Watson also does have a flaw. Sometimes all the possible answers that it comes up with aren't the correct answer. The computer takes parts of a question and searches up information that has to do with it, but isn't always correct.
Watson’s soul purpose is to answer questions. Sure he can “learn” but so doesn’t Google when it corrects human error to find search results, for an example “Did you mean psychophysicotherapeutics”. He’s just as alive as the toaster in my kitchen. I’m not oblivious to artificial intelligence, in fact Watson is indeed a Modern Marvel. Watson cannot express himself. He cannot leave the boundaries that were designated to him. Mankind will continue to push technology forward and maybe in the future machines with be capable of free will. Until then I rather watch people fail at Jeopardy and get things wrong then an advanced calculator have at it. -Everett Lima
Ever since “Deep Blue,” another IBM machine designed to beat the world’s best chess champion in 1997, I have had a feeling that soon enough we would have computers that will be able to learn and have functional states of its own. Deep Blue was another enormous accomplishment by IBM where it demonstrated extreme analytical skills by beating Garry Kasparov. Of course it took IBM several years and several versions of it to beat Garry Kasparov, but in the end they managed to beat him. Deep Blue wasn’t capable of learning (no input) but it was capable of calculation millions of options (outputs). Sooner or later IBM would create a machine capable of having both inputs and outputs. In other words, the fact that Watson can learn by his mistakes and to have the option of making decisions is amazing. The decision making is still primitive because it depends on its confidence level, but eventually this computer will be able to have self-aware decision making capabilities. Nonetheless, Watson is a true scientific advancement. During the final Jeopardy is where I truly began noticing many superior qualities the brain had over the machine. For example, when Ken and Brad began responding the questions faster than Watson, made me think that the human brain is far more superior to machines. Watson had 2800 cores and had a two second delay, while the human mind had two second advantage over Watson. In the market today, we have i7 with a maximum of 4 cores with hyper threading, which gives four additional (virtual) cores; so in the end we have a maximum of 8 cores. Watson has 2800 cores and at times, it was struggling with the human competitors, especially in the Final Jeopardy. It needed a big room with several servers connected together for it to be able to function. The mind only takes several cubed inches of space in our skull and is sometimes faster than Watson. It is unbelievable how much progress we have made today with technology that can have both inputs and outputs and is able to be compared to a human mind. Furthermore, it is unbelievable how amazing and superior the human mind is to anything we have ever created.
To be honest with you I give credit to IBM for creating such a machine, emphasis on create. It’s a machine that has been programmed and instilled with information fed into it. Technology has made huge leaps through out the years and this machine called “Watson” is a prime example of that. Nothing it does is natural its not real. It can not be better or more superior than humans especially when all of its knowledge was implanted by actual humans. It does prove that it can think and have thought of its own, but there all in some way connected to the humans. The jeopardy contestants most likely went and studied their hardest just so they can be able to answer most of these questions. Long hours of repetition and practice just to remember just one measly answer at best. While on the other hand “Watson” just get all the information plugged into him and just has to differentiate possible answers and the likelihood getting them right 9 out of 10 times. We humans are more superior since we are the ones creating these machines so we have the genius minds and “Watson” is our understudy, lol. - Jonas Metayer
No matter the hardware or software that supports Watson, the fundamental difference is that Watson does not have the ability to think. This brings up the question, if something has the ability to think, what it capable of thinking is. Are those thoughts programmed and only triggered or are those thoughts actually thought of by the machine. Datacenters have served their purpose, they simply store data and making it available to use. IBM has gone further and made this datacenter smart enough to recognize question, to perform a query to retrieve the answer and the ability to verbally answer. This takes me back to my original point, when you have machines with the ability to think what they are going to think about. What will define the ideas that they come up with, will the ideas be right or wrong, what will define what is right or wrong. The other point that I am trying to make is that in order for computers to function there have to be a parameter or definition for each and every function, the parameter for think will be the most complex one yet to be developed. There is a big difference between think and know, the day machines can do the thinking many of the problems in the world will be solved. The day machines start to over think we humans need to have control of the switch to turn it off. Side comment: A good movie that relates to Artificial Intelligence (AI) is Eagle Eye.
I remembered the first time I saw one of those dolls that respond to certain stimuli. I was astonished to see that. At first glance, I thought it was just a simple machine with a huge amount of information in his data base. However, after understanding the complexity of its operator system, I get even more amaze than when seeing the emotional doll. It is true what Dr. David Ferucci, Watson principal investigator, says, we are doing things that we never imagined we could do before. Certainly Watson is a humongous step, not only in science and technology, but also in our lives. It is so incredible that a machine can react to a question, can think to give an answer; especially with such a vocabulary. Language, certainly, it is a big step because of the amount of emotion, wordplay, etc. Nevertheless, it is sad that we are trying to play “God” in a way by creating all this new entities; after all, our nature is to get to the level of our creator. Also, it is scary that we are creating this A.I. very close to what a human is capable of doing as thinking, and language are. Very far from that, Because of the easy understanding in the natural language, Watson could be a big help for the concord of humanity such as in customer service and health-care. As long as we keep creating this with the purpose to help human race, I believe it is an outstanding step toward the future.
Watson is a leap in technology because it comprehends what is being asked, rather than input-output, it offers understanding. It truly understands what is being asked, and it does not simply look for the word that mostly relates to the given question; it looks for the answer to the “meaning” of those words. Watson also proves to be a big leap because it “knows what it knows, and knows what it doesn’t know.” It offers different answers to a question with probabilities of being correct; something that we, as people, also do on daily basis: “I about 75% sure about that… .”
IBM’s creation sets a foot forward in the making of supercomputers that begin to exhibit human capabilities. Although we are a long way from machines being able to perform the same set of activities as humans (creating from imagination, etc) it cannot be debated that computers already have greater computational and analytical capacities than the average person. Computers will takes us into places where the human mind is not capable of going. We, as all species, have limited mental capabilities that in turn limit the amount of things we can understand; the same way an ape cannot understand calculus, there are things out there that, in the future, our minds will not be able to comprehend. Computers will be our aid in understanding these mind-boggling problems and computers will, one day, be more powerful than all the human minds put together. Will computers be able to exhibit emotion and truly have creativity? That is something I cannot answers, but what I do know is that they will have analytical capabilities beyond our wildest dreams (lets hope that as a race we will be smart enough to not blow each other off the face of our planet and see computers undergo further development).
A system designed for answers is what the Watson is; however I’m not sold on the idea despite it being groundbreaking computer system. I have always felt that man creates without thinking about mankind it self. I say this because computers are slowly taking away jobs from people, this is seen on are turnpikes where as in now they have taken the toll stops and run off of the sun pass alone. Also there are not many telephone rep people anymore, you answer to an automotive rep and rarely will you be sent to an actual telephone rep. This saddens me because many people lose their jobs when companies upgrade to automotive systems, yet again this outstanding progress from where we were 40 or 50 years ago. In due time computers will ultimately control the whole world as if they don’t already. Moreover, this technology scares me and with time who knows where the Watson will be, and I know that it will not be jeopardy.
The development in technology has obviously come a long way over the years. Watson is a machine, and although it is able to answer questions and may seem intelligent, it is not human. This advancement in technology cannot compare to human capabilities in acquiring new knowledge. The Watson machine cannot surpass the human mind. However, I do think it is fascinating how far science and technology have come. i think their will be more developments in the future involving the relationship between artificial intelligence and human capabilities. I still feel that the human mind is too complex and can never be duplicated by a machine.
It is no lie that computers have been overtaking our lives. Now-a-days very few of us can get by through the day without in some sort of way depending on technology; and where will this take us? With "Watson" I cannot help but to remember the movie "I Robot" where the creation of AI led to the demise of humanity. Although from the scientific and engineering point of view it is rather fascinating to be able to create a machine that can learn and somewhat "think" by itself. And if we are able to create such a machine, what will be its use? How will it benefit us? If it able to think like us, will it be capable of analyzing and rebelling against what we would want them to do? If we will ever get to this point, I do not know but what I do know is that at the moment is fascinating to have small scale, not massively produced machines that can think. Hopefully we are able to find a beneficial use to these marvelous machines and not just completely depend on it like we have gotten used to over the past few decades with the surge of new technologies.
The theory of the mind that we have focused most attention on is functionalism. The job of a theory of the mind is to tell us the fundamental nature of mental states. According to functionalism, mental states are functional states. Computers are themselves simply machines that mimic functions. And so, according to functionalism, mental states are like the software states of a computer. In theory, then, it is possible that a machine running the right kind of computer program could have mental states, it could literally have a mind. It could have beliefs, hopes and pains. And, if it could have a mind, then it could also be intelligent. All of this assumes, of course, that functionalism is true. But is it? Is it really possible for Watson to be intelligent? No, it is simply human input and outputs that will in turn end human life to when A.I will use us to their advantage.
23 comments:
Animals should have rights as they are living things. We as humans do many inhumane things to animals, such as animal farms where animals are being tortured before they are slaughter and prepared for shipment. Monkeys are being experimented on. Chickens are in camps were they are over crowed and not feed. Cows are being stab and hang while they shank there throat. I know animals cant talk for them selves but it is up to us to do it for them. It is some what legal issue but its just being humane about going about how they kill the animals so that humans can eat.
Watson is a machine. It cannot think, it cannot feel, and it cannot create out of self creativeness. Even though this is being considered as a breakthrough, and I believe it to be, it has still not done enough to initiate amazement in me. Why? Well, I feel that the technology developed with Watson could have been developed before. Why? Well… inventions and breakthroughs such as Watson are, for the most part, funded by big corporations which do nothing but collect as much money as they can as a vampire would do to blood at a blood bank. What about those who have innovative ideas with grand potential but are left in the shadow because they don’t have a thirty billion brand name behind them. This, in my opinion, is a problem. Today, in this country, the greatest minds don’t necessarily go into science. They go into finance; they go to Wall Street. And the few who have great ideas but no budget have to worry about competing with others with also great ideas and low budgets. All I’m saying is that if people didn’t value certain things as much, like money, maybe then they could work together and achieve incredible feats. Instead they compete for the recognition and whenever a great idea wins, another one decays. This is capitalism. It may be thought to be the world’s best system, but I think it makes things like Watson seem incredible now, when it could have been seen as incredible before.
Christian Pain
The whole Watson situation is somewhat laughable. I saw the week in which Jeopardy had the IBM machine playing against the 'professionals'. Honestly, it just seemed like a Google machine. Give an answer, find a question or statement that it relates to. Plagiarism? It seems that way. It's a system of inputs and outputs that we can do ourselves. Sure Watson is faster, but that is what computers were made to do in some context. It really amazes me that IBM feels the need to create Watson to accomplish further breakthroughs and accomplishments. Are we not becoming lazy? We need to spend at the least, millions of dollars and countless hours to make a MACHINE. In which it will do the work of finance, health care and the like for us. Now why could we not do that instead? The function of Watson is not like a human, nor that of an animal. I don't believe people should be anymore impressed with it (because IT is a THING), than when computers and new technology are released. I'm counting on the day when Watson or maybe Wanda (the next one in line perhaps?) comes out in different colors such as pink.
--Xiomara Ingles
I believe that animals should have rights as they also form a part of the family we control in this ecosystem. To have legal action, and abolish slaughter houses would be absolutely insane. We have the same rights they have to eat what they are meant to eat and we are at the top of the food chain, it is not our option it is our position. My argument is you do not stop a lion from feeding on a zebra because it is unethical. If it is inhumane for us to eat them than I am afraid we have lost a sense of what is truly humane. I love animals, I have bred about 12 beautiful maltese's and I personally try to be a peaceful loving person; i would only kill an animal if it was my only option to eat and yes I would do it in a heartbeat. The amount of protein in our foods is essential to our diets. They are going to die anyway they are just cattle they might have feelings but you can't get all mushy if you wanna eat something that was alive if you don't like it go ahead and be a vegan i enjoy my meat.
The development in technology has raised many important questions over the years. It is an outstanding and smart choices of bring out new innovations in our world. It is also a very fascinating way to introduce the world to better mainframe. However, this advance in technology can’t compare to humans abilities in acquiring new knowledge. It is simply a programming thing that makes most of us stupid in some ways we lost the ability to think. I understand it is intelligent as it can be, but it will never surpass the human mind. I believe human beings will stay as the only and the smartest being on earth. I am not convince of this IBM’s huge impact in the world.
With the advancement of technology, everything seems possible. But where are these advances is heading? Is it for the better or for the worse? Technology has made us what we are today, the progress, the modern things we are all enjoying, from the simple to the most complicated machine we ever saw. The development in computer technology is going very fast and today's IBM wants to challenge the human mind. Watson is a supercomputer that won the most famous game show in the U.S., the Jeopardy. This is not the first time that IBM tested the effectiveness of human intelligence. The supercomputer Deep Blue beat the world chess master Garry Kasparov, and that was the first time the world realize that those silly machines with no intelligence were perhaps not as silly after all. In fact, IBM company invested in powerful systems of Watson; to claim that machines are now able to mimic the human brain. No matter what the human initiative, there seem to be times when a controversy over new computer advance arises. From norm to social values, and ideologies, technology is often seen as the beast which challenges all of the traditions of human beings. Between ethical dilemmas and future expectations, we can not deny is that computers are father every day. And with that, Who Wins? In the end we all come out winners, either with new equipment for health, innovations in the media or the way businesses are managed. Technology and the man always walk together towards prosperity. How computer eventually impacts human as a whole remains to be seen, however, if current trends continue, processing capacity and artificial intelligence will be more common in computer.
Meet Watson. He’s made up of 100 (total) IBM power 7-50 servers, has a memory capacity of 15 trillion bytes, learns by trial and error, and most importantly “knows what it knows, and knows what it doesn’t know.” Furthermore, “some of the world’s most brilliant minds have created this very impressive system.” As Watson shows off his skills on the Jeopardy game show, he proves that one does not have to have a brain to be intelligent. Does this mean Watson is more impressive than his human competitors? While Watson may share the same causal role as, let’s say, a physician assistant, what Watson lacks that a physician assistant doesn’t is l’espirit. Watson is merely a group of brilliant minds put together into one machine; therefore, Watson, in and of itself, can’t be impressive; it merely cheats off of the knowledge its creators pre-equipped it with. When it comes down to l’espirit, artificial intelligence/Watson/man-made machines are void and, therefore, can never be superior to humans. We can never be superior to God, He is our creator; the same way machines will never be superior to humans, we create them. Nonetheless, not only does Watson steal the credit of “the world’s most brilliant minds,” but it also stole my answer to the Daily Double!!
The function of Watson is pretty ridiculous to me really. I mean, really? Our society is truly going about this whole creation of “robots” and doing things for us in the wrong way. Why do we want a computer that is supposed to outsmart humans? This is really getting out of hand. Don’t get me wrong, the advancement of technology is mesmerizing. But it is also scaring me a little. In 30 years, where will we be? Will we all have super computers doing our homework for us? Will we have developed a robot to clean our house? I feel like even with the advancement we have with technology, we are also losing ourselves in the mix. We are more concerned with the development of a super computer that can think like a human. What’s the point in this? Why are we trying to compete with a computer? Clearly, the computer is going to win, especially if it’s a “super” computer. Our society is swaying in the wrong direction with this. We are creating devices that are becoming superior to humans. We are losing our touch with nature, becoming more concerned with the physical concepts of life, and this will ultimately become our demise. Is that what we want? Do we want to be overpowered? Well, whatever these scientists are doing, they are definitely creating a recipe for disaster.
Watson is an impressive accomplishment. It will definitely bring further advancement in our technology but where is this all going? We see how machines now perform factory work leaving people out jobs, would Watson be taking over hospitals as physician assistants? Technology has certainly made our lives easier but it does have its cons. We see less human contact, things are transitioning into automated actions. You place a phone call for customer service a machine answers and sometimes it seems more difficult speaking to it than a person. As technology advances I see how we become more and more dependent to electronics. If were not allowed to use a computer, cell phone or electronic device for a week, some would probably have some form of an anxiety attack. Watson is a great accomplishment for the technological world but will it be as beneficial as they say when it comes to dealing with humans? Hopefully it would benefit us and not add to our addiction of electronics.
-Louisiana Baltodano
Watson is pretty awesome. Looking back at the old episode of jeopardy when it first came out its a big improvement and definitely a breakthrough. What intrigued me the most is how it learns from trial and error. The ability to make a mistake and learn from that mistake is very fascinating. I don't believe however it to have a mind or even be anywhere close to that aspect, but i surely believe that in the near future the technological development will be much more advanced. It's kind of scary to think about. If a machine can learn from trial and error in the end there is no stopping it. It's intelligence must grow. And i don't ever believe a machine, as advanced as it can get, will ever have a mind, because even it it can and may know the physical properties of each feeling or emotions etc. it will never have the certain qualia of being a person and having a mind. Like Nagel's bats, Just because it knows what a mind is and every aspect of it, it will never have a mind therefor will never know what is it's like to have a mind.
Watson is a pretty big breakthrough in artificial intelligence that can understand human language. No lie, this wired creature does a better job at recognizing words than the current automated robots customer serve directories have. But, overall I don't believe machines like Watson can compare to human abilities. Watching the take on what Watson could do for healthcare doesn't amaze me at all. Just like doctors, Watson can make mistakes too. Watson could mistaken a stroke for a heart attack because of similar symptoms. Although yes it would narrow down the possibilities for a doctor or a nurse, it also takes away the art and makes them lazy in using their own cognitive abilities to diagnose a patient. I can see where it would work in certain aspects of healthcare like pharmacy (which already have computers doing part of their job like Lucy and Ricky at the VA Medical Center in Miami). I can see where it works in customer service (because he won't show the emotion of frustration…maybe). Watson is a smart computer. I can see where it would work, I see it learns through trial and error like us, but in the end, you still need a human to follow up.
Simply put, Watson has been an inevitable creation from computer science and is completely a necessary for the advancements for computer science and technology. Watson is not a Google machine, for being a machine articulately "designed" for a single purpose, answering and functioning that is all geared to jeopardy. No matter the heights of computer science, human's are still a necessary condition for computers to exist, without human's even the "smartest" computers cannot do without the aid of Human's. In fact, the Watson is in fact not a situation, but an applaudable and exciting achievement, to exemplify the knowledge that a mere thousands of silicon chips can do with the necessary programmers and computer scientists. Computers like these would be amazing in all work environments from medical fields to space. It would be substantial to afford a machine such as Watson all over the fields of education and human advancement, though we cannot 100% depend on a machine greater or equivalently this intelligent. To correct, Watson consists, of 750 servers enclosed in 10 racks, 16 Terabytes, 2880 cores, running on a Linux system. Any means, Watson brings us great excitement, a well worth computing feat.
Dinah said.
To me Watson, is a big accomplishment for computer technology. His artificial intelligence has evolved greatly since his first game of Jeopardy. With all that memory, the internet wasn't even needed for any answers because he had all the answers in him saved the same way us humans use our prior knowledge. Watson in the future can help revolutionize the way everyday life is. It could be used to help doctors diagnose disease in patients or help make life easier for people who have a lot to do during the day. One more thing Watson can help do is work customer service lines on the phone. Its trouble shooting abilities can help identify the customers problems faster then the automated systems that are currently in place. On the contrary, Watson also does have a flaw. Sometimes all the possible answers that it comes up with aren't the correct answer. The computer takes parts of a question and searches up information that has to do with it, but isn't always correct.
Watson’s soul purpose is to answer questions. Sure he can “learn” but so doesn’t Google when it corrects human error to find search results, for an example “Did you mean psychophysicotherapeutics”. He’s just as alive as the toaster in my kitchen. I’m not oblivious to artificial intelligence, in fact Watson is indeed a Modern Marvel. Watson cannot express himself. He cannot leave the boundaries that were designated to him. Mankind will continue to push technology forward and maybe in the future machines with be capable of free will. Until then I rather watch people fail at Jeopardy and get things wrong then an advanced calculator have at it.
-Everett Lima
Ever since “Deep Blue,” another IBM machine designed to beat the world’s best chess champion in 1997, I have had a feeling that soon enough we would have computers that will be able to learn and have functional states of its own. Deep Blue was another enormous accomplishment by IBM where it demonstrated extreme analytical skills by beating Garry Kasparov. Of course it took IBM several years and several versions of it to beat Garry Kasparov, but in the end they managed to beat him. Deep Blue wasn’t capable of learning (no input) but it was capable of calculation millions of options (outputs). Sooner or later IBM would create a machine capable of having both inputs and outputs. In other words, the fact that Watson can learn by his mistakes and to have the option of making decisions is amazing. The decision making is still primitive because it depends on its confidence level, but eventually this computer will be able to have self-aware decision making capabilities. Nonetheless, Watson is a true scientific advancement. During the final Jeopardy is where I truly began noticing many superior qualities the brain had over the machine. For example, when Ken and Brad began responding the questions faster than Watson, made me think that the human brain is far more superior to machines. Watson had 2800 cores and had a two second delay, while the human mind had two second advantage over Watson. In the market today, we have i7 with a maximum of 4 cores with hyper threading, which gives four additional (virtual) cores; so in the end we have a maximum of 8 cores. Watson has 2800 cores and at times, it was struggling with the human competitors, especially in the Final Jeopardy. It needed a big room with several servers connected together for it to be able to function. The mind only takes several cubed inches of space in our skull and is sometimes faster than Watson. It is unbelievable how much progress we have made today with technology that can have both inputs and outputs and is able to be compared to a human mind. Furthermore, it is unbelievable how amazing and superior the human mind is to anything we have ever created.
To be honest with you I give credit to IBM for creating such a machine, emphasis on create. It’s a machine that has been programmed and instilled with information fed into it. Technology has made huge leaps through out the years and this machine called “Watson” is a prime example of that. Nothing it does is natural its not real. It can not be better or more superior than humans especially when all of its knowledge was implanted by actual humans. It does prove that it can think and have thought of its own, but there all in some way connected to the humans. The jeopardy contestants most likely went and studied their hardest just so they can be able to answer most of these questions. Long hours of repetition and practice just to remember just one measly answer at best. While on the other hand “Watson” just get all the information plugged into him and just has to differentiate possible answers and the likelihood getting them right 9 out of 10 times. We humans are more superior since we are the ones creating these machines so we have the genius minds and “Watson” is our understudy, lol.
- Jonas Metayer
No matter the hardware or software that supports Watson, the fundamental difference is that Watson does not have the ability to think. This brings up the question, if something has the ability to think, what it capable of thinking is. Are those thoughts programmed and only triggered or are those thoughts actually thought of by the machine. Datacenters have served their purpose, they simply store data and making it available to use. IBM has gone further and made this datacenter smart enough to recognize question, to perform a query to retrieve the answer and the ability to verbally answer.
This takes me back to my original point, when you have machines with the ability to think what they are going to think about. What will define the ideas that they come up with, will the ideas be right or wrong, what will define what is right or wrong. The other point that I am trying to make is that in order for computers to function there have to be a parameter or definition for each and every function, the parameter for think will be the most complex one yet to be developed. There is a big difference between think and know, the day machines can do the thinking many of the problems in the world will be solved. The day machines start to over think we humans need to have control of the switch to turn it off. Side comment: A good movie that relates to Artificial Intelligence (AI) is Eagle Eye.
I remembered the first time I saw one of those dolls that respond to certain stimuli. I was astonished to see that. At first glance, I thought it was just a simple machine with a huge amount of information in his data base. However, after understanding the complexity of its operator system, I get even more amaze than when seeing the emotional doll. It is true what Dr. David Ferucci, Watson principal investigator, says, we are doing things that we never imagined we could do before. Certainly Watson is a humongous step, not only in science and technology, but also in our lives. It is so incredible that a machine can react to a question, can think to give an answer; especially with such a vocabulary. Language, certainly, it is a big step because of the amount of emotion, wordplay, etc. Nevertheless, it is sad that we are trying to play “God” in a way by creating all this new entities; after all, our nature is to get to the level of our creator. Also, it is scary that we are creating this A.I. very close to what a human is capable of doing as thinking, and language are. Very far from that, Because of the easy understanding in the natural language, Watson could be a big help for the concord of humanity such as in customer service and health-care. As long as we keep creating this with the purpose to help human race, I believe it is an outstanding step toward the future.
Watson is a leap in technology because it comprehends what is being asked, rather than input-output, it offers understanding. It truly understands what is being asked, and it does not simply look for the word that mostly relates to the given question; it looks for the answer to the “meaning” of those words. Watson also proves to be a big leap because it “knows what it knows, and knows what it doesn’t know.” It offers different answers to a question with probabilities of being correct; something that we, as people, also do on daily basis: “I about 75% sure about that… .”
IBM’s creation sets a foot forward in the making of supercomputers that begin to exhibit human capabilities. Although we are a long way from machines being able to perform the same set of activities as humans (creating from imagination, etc) it cannot be debated that computers already have greater computational and analytical capacities than the average person. Computers will takes us into places where the human mind is not capable of going. We, as all species, have limited mental capabilities that in turn limit the amount of things we can understand; the same way an ape cannot understand calculus, there are things out there that, in the future, our minds will not be able to comprehend. Computers will be our aid in understanding these mind-boggling problems and computers will, one day, be more powerful than all the human minds put together. Will computers be able to exhibit emotion and truly have creativity? That is something I cannot answers, but what I do know is that they will have analytical capabilities beyond our wildest dreams (lets hope that as a race we will be smart enough to not blow each other off the face of our planet and see computers undergo further development).
Alberto J. Ruiz
A system designed for answers is what the Watson is; however I’m not sold on the idea despite it being groundbreaking computer system. I have always felt that man creates without thinking about mankind it self. I say this because computers are slowly taking away jobs from people, this is seen on are turnpikes where as in now they have taken the toll stops and run off of the sun pass alone. Also there are not many telephone rep people anymore, you answer to an automotive rep and rarely will you be sent to an actual telephone rep. This saddens me because many people lose their jobs when companies upgrade to automotive systems, yet again this outstanding progress from where we were 40 or 50 years ago. In due time computers will ultimately control the whole world as if they don’t already. Moreover, this technology scares me and with time who knows where the Watson will be, and I know that it will not be jeopardy.
-Kenny Philistin
The development in technology has obviously come a long way over the years. Watson is a machine, and although it is able to answer questions and may seem intelligent, it is not human. This advancement in technology cannot compare to human capabilities in acquiring new knowledge. The Watson machine cannot surpass the human mind. However, I do think it is fascinating how far science and technology have come. i think their will be more developments in the future involving the relationship between artificial intelligence and human capabilities. I still feel that the human mind is too complex and can never be duplicated by a machine.
It is no lie that computers have been overtaking our lives. Now-a-days very few of us can get by through the day without in some sort of way depending on technology; and where will this take us? With "Watson" I cannot help but to remember the movie "I Robot" where the creation of AI led to the demise of humanity. Although from the scientific and engineering point of view it is rather fascinating to be able to create a machine that can learn and somewhat "think" by itself. And if we are able to create such a machine, what will be its use? How will it benefit us? If it able to think like us, will it be capable of analyzing and rebelling against what we would want them to do? If we will ever get to this point, I do not know but what I do know is that at the moment is fascinating to have small scale, not massively produced machines that can think. Hopefully we are able to find a beneficial use to these marvelous machines and not just completely depend on it like we have gotten used to over the past few decades with the surge of new technologies.
The theory of the mind that we have focused most attention on is functionalism. The job of a theory of the mind is to tell us the fundamental nature of mental states. According to functionalism, mental states are functional states. Computers are themselves simply machines that mimic functions. And so, according to functionalism, mental states are like the software states of a computer. In theory, then, it is possible that a machine running the right kind of computer program could have mental states, it could literally have a mind. It could have beliefs, hopes and pains. And, if it could have a mind, then it could also be intelligent.
All of this assumes, of course, that functionalism is true. But is it? Is it really possible for Watson to be intelligent? No, it is simply human input and outputs that will in turn end human life to when A.I will use us to their advantage.
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