Lecture Notes: The Evolution of Intelligent Systems

Introduction

• Modern thinking about intelligent systems began with Alan Turing's 1950 paper.
• Turing introduced the Turing Test to address the inability to define intelligence.

Turing Test

• Definition: If a human cannot tell within five minutes if they're talking to a computer or a person, the computer passes the test.
• Turing's context: Dealt with teletypes, similar to texting today.
• Purpose: Not just to define intelligence, but to counter objections regarding the future of computer cognition.

Key Insights from Turing

• Suggested that serious discussions about computers thinking were valid.
• Forecasted the eventual capability of computers to think.

Development of AI (Post-Turing)

• About 10 years after Turing:
  • Marvin Minsky and John McCarthy set up important laboratories.
  • Allen Newell and Herbert Simon focused on human thinking models.

Approaches to AI

• John McCarthy's Approach:

  • Emphasized mathematical logic.
  • Dedicated to bending logic to model intelligence.

• Newell and Simon's Approach:

  • Developed systems solving puzzles and problems consistent with human experiments.

• Marvin Minsky's Approach:

  • Argued no single representation/method could fully understand intelligence.
  • Central message from his 1961 paper, "Steps Toward Artificial Intelligence."

Pioneers of AI

• Turing and Minsky regarded as founders of artificial intelligence.

AI's First Wave (1960s)

• James Slagle's Program:
  • Focused on integrating symbolic expressions.
  • Modeled freshman mathematics at MIT.
  • Introduced the concept of problem reduction:
    • Breaking complex problems into simpler subproblems.

Outcomes of AI Research by 1970

• AI programs could:
  • Understand drawings.
  • Learn from examples.
  • Construct structures.
  • Answer questions similarly to modern assistants like Siri and Alexa.