Comments on: Artificial Stupidity: The Next Big Thing

By: Kspivack

Kspivack — Tue, 10 Aug 2010 08:11:11 +0000

this essay should be on the ny times op ed page! its great, funny & true! all the best.

By: Allison Fishman

Allison Fishman — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 16:19:11 +0000

Hmmm. Sounds like you need a secretary or a wife, someone to do all the annoying things you don’t want to do. As I recall, we call this folks interns…or recent college grads? While we underestimate the challenge and sticktoitiveness required to address the mundane.

By: Javier Ruiz Aranguren

Javier Ruiz Aranguren — Mon, 28 Jan 2008 17:59:29 +0000

Hi, Nova. A great post.
I wanted to reply you properly, so I have used my own blog to do it:
The Artificial Mediocrity, The Next Necessary Thing (http://www.geospatialmeaning.eu/2008/01/28/artificial-mediocrity-the-next-necessary-thing/)
Best regards.

By: Praveen

Praveen — Mon, 28 Jan 2008 01:05:29 +0000

Very interesting… I suggest a twist to your perspective which I believe will be more digestible.
In my opinion, even doing routine things you mentioned require some artificial intelligence. For e.g. “organizing emails” require some basic intelligence. I do agree that rather than focusing on higher level intelligence like chess game etc, we should *first* focus on simpler things and move upwards to higher level stuff.

By: Praveen

Praveen — Mon, 28 Jan 2008 01:04:54 +0000

By: Joe Buhler

Joe Buhler — Sat, 26 Jan 2008 17:45:18 +0000

This is really the way to approach the issue. Makes a lot of sense to me. There is a semantic difference between intelligent and smart! The next web is more about smart agents rather than AI.

By: James Taylor

James Taylor — Fri, 25 Jan 2008 16:04:49 +0000

Love it. This, in fact, was the basic premise behind my recent book (with Neil Raden) called “Smart (enough) Systems”. While others research truly “intelligent” systems, what mot of us need is systems that are just smart enough. Smart enough to point out drug interactions, smart enough to detect fraud, smart enough to route an email appropriately, smart enough to see how likely someone is to be who they say they are.
It’s a great book, though I say so myself!
JT
James Taylor
Author, with Neil Raden, of Smart (Enough) Systems
Blog at http://www.smartenoughsystems.com/wp

By: Joseph

Joseph — Fri, 25 Jan 2008 10:30:43 +0000

While this might me a worthwhile endeavor such complicated tasks may one day elicit the creation of A.I. to deal with the evolution of the more complicated tasks computerization of everyday life will inevitably bring within a continually cyberized world? is not you twine program designed to serve that very purpose? at what point does a level of programming surpass the threshold of simple instruction into the realm of conscious discretion?

By: james shamenski

james shamenski — Fri, 25 Jan 2008 03:12:13 +0000

Ray Kurzweil will have you know that machines will replicate and pass human intelligence in this century. Reading up on the singularity paints a grim outlook of the future. If anything, a semantic web will greatly aid in this transition.
The covered wagon was necessary in helping people move west but like any tool, eventually it will be seen as obsolete. The semantic wave is necessary to progress forward but once robots take over the earth, RDF will be seen as a waste of code.

By: Dan Tecuci

Dan Tecuci — Fri, 25 Jan 2008 00:05:56 +0000

I agree that smart systems need to help us deal with the stuff that they’re good at and we’re not. In that sense, they’re not AI. However, more generally, as soon as a task that was considered “hard” for computers is “solved” (e.g. chess), suddenly it’s no longer AI. Maybe we’re getting better at defining AI or maybe we’re just biased by the lofty goals of AI that were passed down to us…

By: IntelFusion

IntelFusion — Thu, 24 Jan 2008 22:38:01 +0000

Artifical Stupidity v Artifical Intelligence

Nova Spivak makes a great point. Here’s a snippet but be sure to read his entire post.There has been a lot of talk about artificial intelligence. But artificial intelligence scares me. And frankly, I don’t need it. My human intelligence

By: Arjun Ram

Arjun Ram — Thu, 24 Jan 2008 22:03:54 +0000

A well written post. However, who would have dreamnt 15 years ago that computer would be able to recognize semantics! Dream leads to innovation..I would even contend that “finding things that are of interest” isnt much of a stupid task – recommendation and personalization are still tough problems to crack.
As your title mentions the next web is definitely is getting machines to handle our stupid tasks .. Hail Roomba!