What is Artificial Intelligence?
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is one of humanity’s most remarkable and advanced technologies. It has the potential to transform not industries but the whole of society and make many tasks easier and more efficient.
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is basically the simulation of human intelligence in machines (software like ChatGPT) that are designed to think and act like humans. These intelligent systems or software can learn from data, make predictions, and take actions to achieve specific goals.
AI is a versatile technology that is being applied to a growing number of fields and industries. From image and speech recognition, to natural language processing and decision-making, AI has the potential to greatly improve many aspects of our lives.
That doesn’t take into account the fact that the field may be relatively uncharted, which means that any great use of AI we see today is, in a way, just the tip of the AI iceberg.
Experts have talked about this fact many times, but it is still hard to get a clear picture of how AI will affect society in the future.
AI is a rapidly growing field with many exciting developments like ChatGPT, Dall-E 2, and many potential applications. But the field is still relatively new and uncharted. Predicting how these AIs will impact society is a complicated subject. And there is growing concern and debate surrounding AI’s potential risks and challenges, particularly regarding developing advanced AI systems that could match or surpass human intelligence.
As for the impact of chatbots like ChatGPT, it has already created a buzz all over the internet with its multiple uses in coding, creative writing, etc. However, it’s also important to recognize that chatbots like ChatGPT are limited in their capabilities and will not replace human interaction and decision-making.
On the other hand, understanding the different types of AI will provide us a clearer picture of capabilities of AI and the long road ahead for AI development.
What Type of A.I. Are There (Four, Five, and more)?
The different AI types are based on how well they can mimic human cognitive abilities.
So, AI can be put into one of several classes based on how well a machine performs and how well it can adapt compared to humans.
A type of AI that can do more human-like tasks with the same level of ability to do tasks will be considered more advanced.
In this system, an AI with restricted functionality and performance will be considered a simpler (Weak AI) and less evolved type.
There are two general classifications for AI based on this criterion.
One way to classify AI and AI technologies is according to their similarities to human cognitive abilities and their ability to “think” and possibly “experience emotions” like individuals.
According to this classification, there are four major AI-based systems: reactive machines, limited memory machines, theory of mind, and self-aware AI.
Other Classifications are,
➤ Artificial Narrow Intelligence (ANI)
➤ Artificial General Intelligence (AGI)
➤ Artificial Super Intelligence (ASI)
⮚ Reactive Machines
Reactive Machines, as the name suggests, act on simple inputs and outputs.
It is the most basic AI type in use and the first step in the AI system.
This model of AI doesn’t store any input and can’t act based on machine learning models. And because of this, they can’t learn from actions or process past or future actions. They respond only to identical inputs.
Examples of Reactive Machines
- Spam filters used by the email services to keep promotional & phishing emails cluttering the inbox.
- Another example of it is recommendations systems used by the ecommerce websites like Amazon, Netflix to keep users engaged.
⮚ Limited Memory
Limited memory is the most used AI type because of the vast historical data availability.
Limited memory AI builds experiential knowledge by observing actions or data, learning from the historical data.
This kind of AI combines pre-programmed information with historical and observational data to make predictions and carry out challenging classification tasks.
The most common and famous example of limited memory AI is autonomous vehicles like cars and trucks.
To drive autonomously on roads, autonomous vehicles use various sensors to make necessary adjustments.
To recognize the speed & driving patterns of other drivers, it uses limited memory to observe and stay on the road. IT makes these vehicles more secure while interpreting the continuous flow of sensor data.
There are three main categories of limited memory type AI,
➤ Reinforcement learning
➤ Long-term short-term memory (LSTMs)
➤ Evolutionary Generative Adversarial Networks (E-GAN)
⮚ Theory of Mind
If you’re not under a rock, then you certainly heard about the Google engineer’s claim about the AI acting itself and talking about its feelings to the engineer.
That’s what Theory of Mind is supposed to achieve, but we are a long way from this.
Other than taking commands by voice assistants like SIRI or Google, they can’t react to your emotional state.
Artificial Emotional Intelligence and decision-making are two fields of study that are trying to crack the theory of mind.
⮚ Self-Aware
Asimov’s Robot series described how Self-Aware Humanoids can evolve into Artificial Intelligence-based Humanoids.
There are tons of movies that describe this problem of self-aware artificial intelligence.
But all will fail to describe the technology to do this.
But now, with the advance of neural networks mimicked based on human brain neurons, AI engineers are trying to achieve this, but we’re still in its early phase of development.
The AI community observes more than these four categories of artificial intelligence. They have a close similarity but are documented based on applications, capabilities, and ways in which artificial intelligence capabilities are applied.
They are as follows:
⮞Artificial Narrow Intelligence (ANI)
⮞Artificial General Intelligence (AGI)
⮞Artificial Super Intelligence (ASI)
Future of Artificial Intelligence
Will we keep making AI smarter and find new ways to work with it to make it even smarter?
How far will we get toward a theory of mind and a self-aware AI in the upcoming decades?
Will we find another breakthrough like neural networks that will understand higher concepts like emotions?
In the coming decades, how far will we progress toward a theory of mind and self-aware AI?
Maybe a super-smart AI will come along that is even smarter than humans at the moment.
Only time will tell, but as computer science continues to push the boundaries, understanding the differences between the various types of AI will help you make sense of the nuances of AI advancements.
What potential limits do you see for AI?
