91av

GAC (pronounced Jack) is about to undergo a psychological test and it looks
like he鈥檒l turn out to be a sexually deviant depressive. But that isn鈥檛 a
surprise for Chris McKinstry, who created GAC, the Generic Artificial
Consciousness project.

Launched last year, GAC is designed to provide a huge database of
common-sense knowledge. Once complete, it will be used to train an artificial
neural network, says McKinstry, a Canadian computer scientist based in
Chile.

To build up the database, McKinstry asked Internet users from around the
world to submit statements describing everyday experiences, such as 鈥淚 like
dogs鈥� or 鈥渢raffic jams make me mad鈥�
(91av, 9 September 2000, p 14).
Contributors submit a single statement and then rate 20 statements already
on the database as true or false. In this way, GAC builds up a series of views
that are the average of all the people who contribute.

But now McKinstry is concerned about the type of people who have been
contributing to GAC. 鈥淭he demographic tends to skew towards the adolescent
male,鈥� he says. 鈥淪o it鈥檚 appearing a little depressed and a little sexually
deviant.鈥� Too many statements are taking the form of 鈥渕y life is empty and
尘别补苍颈苍驳濒别蝉蝉鈥�.

So to see how GAC is faring after 40,000 contributions, McKinstry has asked
Harvard psychologist Robert Epstein to assess it. Epstein will apply a standard
personality test, called the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory
(MMPI-2), to see how GAC compares with ordinary people.

Epstein says he has no expectations. 鈥淭hat鈥檚 the beauty of this odd
别虫辫别谤颈尘别苍迟.鈥�