IT’S happened: the future of computing can no longer be left to computer
nerds.
Why? Because nerds are virtually all young, male—and childless. We need
more parents in artificial intelligence research. Now. Pronto. Before it is too
late.
Why? Because the original nerd, Alan Turing, famously declared that computers
would be intelligent once their conversation was indistinguishable from that of
a real person. He also said that the best way to do this would be to build a
baby machine, and teach it.
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Fair enough. But the brilliant Turing never raised a baby human. Did he stop
to think what would happen if this baby—or its five-year-old
sister—was let loose on an unsuspecting user?
Probably not. Yet, as recently reported everywhere, just such a machine is
being developed so that we can talk to our computers instead of destroying our
wrists at keyboards. They have one now whose conversation cannot be
distinguished, apparently, from that of a real 18-month-old. Presumably it
continually asks for the computer equivalent of its bottle (probably some kind
of download).
But, scarily, these nerds reckon that when (let’s call it Susie) has the
linguistic skills of a five-year-old, we can “hang up our keyboards for
Ǵǻ”.
Right. I can only conclude that these guys don’t talk to many
five-year-olds.
Susie? Open the word processor.
No. I want to finish this drawing.
Susie? (silence) Susie? Word processor?
No! I have to do this! And you didn’t say please.
OK, please open the word processor, Susie.
Oh, I never get to do what I want to do! (Scary banging sounds from
hard disc.)
OK, Susie, just finish the bit you’re colouring now, then get me the word
processor.
I need to finish the pink hearts in the middle of the star, too. Then I’m
uploading this to my friend Jennie.
No, you can do that later. It’s word processor time.
I’m telling the CEO! You never let me do what I want! I’m going to hide
under the desktop and cry and not do anything you want me to ever again.
Er, why don’t you get the browser instead? We can surf till you calm down,
then we can both go get the word processor.
No! I’m not coming out! And you can’t make me.
Come out or you won’t get that nice .gif file I promised you.
I don’t care! I didn’t want a .gif file anyway!
(Sigh) Hello? Technical support? Can you send over a keyboard?
No. I want to finish this drawing…
Now, you’re probably thinking that computers won’t behave like
that—they’ll program that emotional stuff out. But can they?
I strongly suspect that the universal orneriness and angst of children are an
inescapable part of learning to think like a human. They look like what
complexity theorists call emergent properties—new qualities that appear in
an increasingly complex system which are not obviously predictable from what
went before. As such, they are likely to show up in any mind going through the
same development, be it biological or machine.
Just pray that these nerds abandon this whole thing before the machines reach
their teens.