Artificial Intelligence: More Questions than Answers

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I’ve been covering artificial intelligence (AI) and related technologies for years, particularly at events such as the annual Consumer Electronics Show (CES). As I write this, we are in the run-up to CES 2019, and the Artificial Intelligence Conference in San Francisco, so the AI landscape is likely to change—at an ever-accelerating rate. Let’s look at some of the challenges facing AI now, and then after CES 2019 we can take another look.

As the title suggests, in this quickly changing segment of the electronics industry, there may be more questions than answers. Fittingly, I think it’s best for us to start with one great question about artificial intelligence, and we’ll go on from there.

Q. What is artificial intelligence (AI), and are machines capable of being intelligent?

A. The English Oxford Living Dictionary defines AI this way: “The theory and development of computer systems able to perform tasks that normally require human intelligence, such as visual perception, speech recognition, decision-making, and translation between languages.”

Or how about simply, AI is something that hasn't been done yet without human intervention. Some technologies that were considered AI just a few years ago such as conversational speed language translation and optical character recognition are no longer considered AI.

It is obvious that we have entered the era of common use of AI. Autonomous transportation is now a case of when, not if, thanks to groundbreaking companies like NVIDIA. Virtual personal assistants such as Cortana, Alexa, Hey Google and Siri are now part of our everyday lives. Today’s military training simulators and popular first-person shooting games such as “Far Cry” and “Call of Duty” make significant use of AI by utilizing artificial enemies that can analyze the user’s environments and actions, as well as find objects and calculate actions that might be beneficial to the user’s survival and victory.

To read this entire article, which appeared in the September 2018 issue of Design007 Magazine, click here.

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