ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE CAN SOLVE 'WICKED PROBLEMS'

A "HUMAN-MACHINE" SUPER-INTELLIGENCE IS AVAILABLE, SAY SCIENTISTS, AND THAT WILL SOLVE ALL OUR"WICKED PROBLEMS".

WE ALL KNOW WHAT ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE (AI) IS, BUT WHAT ARE 'WICKED PROBLEMS'?


"They’re essentially problems that are extremely complex with a huge amount of variables that makes it difficult for an individual to figure out a solution. Problems like the spread of disease, climate change, and geopolitical strife are impossible to solve by even the smartest minds, but as it turns out, no one is as smart as all of us, which is why crowdsourcing could be the key.

Scientists at the Human Computation Institute and Cornell University believe that this radical new concept could solve some of the most fundamental problems facing humanity, and crowdsourcing combined with AI could be the key to tackling wicked problems.
Crowdsourcing is having individuals attack certain elements of a problem, and the combined effort results in a more complex and nuanced solution. AI could be used to manage this process, creating a super problem-solving system that could rid us of the ills facing mankind.

It’s an exciting revelation that could be one of the hallmarks of the development of mankind in the 21st century, and it could lead to tremendous breakthroughs in dealing with some of the most vexing problems.

IN ONE VIDEO AT http://www.eurekalert.org/multimedia/pub/105738.php ,
Dr. Pietro Michelucci, Director, Human Computation Institute, describes human computation, and discusses why we need humans computing when we have supercomputers, the challenges faced today, how to build effective systems, and what the future might hold for machine intelligence. 

[MY NOTE: At first glance this all seems a bit silly, but diving into it, what I find is that it is simply what ancient people did, the "tribes", if you will, who realized it took ALL members to survive, that EVERY member was a contributor to the "common good".
They were no stronger than their weakest link, so they strengthened every link as much as possible.

This also finally, FINALLY shows us that perhaps science has seen the futility of trying to create any machine that can come close to matching a HUMAN MIND, so they're going on to the realistic approach...using living human minds, as many as they can.]

HUMAN COMPUTERS?
In an article published in the journal Science, the authors present a new vision of human computation (the science of crowd-powered systems), which pushes beyond traditional limits, and takes on hard problems that until recently have remained out of reach.

Humans surpass machines at many things, ranging from simple pattern recognition to creative abstraction. With the help of computers, these cognitive abilities can be effectively combined into multidimensional collaborative networks that achieve what traditional problem-solving cannot.
Most of today's human computation systems rely on sending bite-sized 'micro-tasks' to many individuals and then stitching together the results.
For example, 165,000 volunteers in EyeWire have analyzed thousands of images online to help build the world's most complete map of human retinal neurons.

This microtasking approach alone cannot address the tough challenges we face today, say the authors. A radically new approach is needed to solve "wicked problems" - those that involve many interacting systems that are constantly changing, and whose solutions have unforeseen consequences (e.g., corruption resulting from financial aid given in response to a natural disaster).

New human computation technologies can help.

 Recent techniques provide real-time access to crowd-based inputs, where individual contributions can be processed by a computer and sent to the next person for improvement or analysis of a different kind. This enables the construction of more flexible collaborative environments that can better address the most challenging issues.

This idea is already taking shape in several human computation projects, including YardMap.org, which was launched by the Cornell in 2012 to map global conservation efforts one parcel at a time. "By sharing and observing practices in a map-based social network, people can begin to relate their individual efforts to the global conservation potential of living and working landscapes," says Janis Dickinson, Professor and Director of Citizen Science at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology.  YardMap allows participants to interact and build on each other's work - something that crowdsourcing alone cannot achieve. The project serves as an important model for how such bottom-up, socially networked systems can bring about scalable changes how we manage residential landscapes.

HCI has recently set out to use crowd-power to accelerate Cornell-based Alzheimer's disease research. WeCureAlz.com combines two successful microtasking systems into an interactive analytic pipeline that builds blood flow models of mouse brains.

The stardust@home system, which was used to search for comet dust in one million images of aerogel, is being adapted to identify stalled blood vessels, which will then be pinpointed in the brain by a modified version of the EyeWire system.

"By enabling members of the general public to play some simple online game, we expect to reduce the time to treatment discovery from decades to just a few years", says HCI director and lead author, Dr. Pietro Michelucci. "This gives an opportunity for anyone, including the tech-savvy generation of caregivers and early stage AD patients, to take the matter into their own hands."

DID THOUGHTS OF THE "BORG COLLECTIVE" ENTER ANYONE ELSE'S MIND WHEN YOU READ THIS?
~~I;-)

SERIOUSLY, IT IS A BIT LIKE THAT, DON'T YOU THINK?


"HUMAN FREE WILL BEATS COMPUTER INTELLIGENCE"

It turns out that our free will may be freer than previously thought. Scientists have taken a closer look at the conscious will and determinism in decision-making and have found that people can actually cancel a movement once the brain has started preparing it.

In the 1980s, researchers demonstrated that conscious decisions were initiated by unconscious brain processes, and that a wave of brain activity referred to as a "readiness potential" could be recorded even before the subject had made a conscious decision.

But how could the unconscious brain know IN ADVANCE what decision a person is going to make at a time when they are not yet sure themselves?
Until now, the existence of such preparatory brain processes has been regarded as evidence of "determinism," according to which free will is nothing but an illusion.
Now, researchers have found that this isn't the case.

DUELLING MINDS
As part of the study, the researchers asked study participants to enter a "duel" with a computer and monitor their brain waves throughout the duration of the game using electroencephalography (EEG). A computer was then tasked with using these EEG data to predict when a subject would move, the aim being to out-maneuver the player. 

"A person's decisions are not at the mercy of unconscious and early brain waves," said John-Dylan Haynes, one of the researchers, in a news release.

"They are able to actively intervene in the decision-making process and interrupt a movement.

Previously people have used the preparatory brain signals to argue against free will.
Our study now shows that the freedom is much less limited than previously thought.
However, there is a 'point of no return' in the decision-making process, after which cancellation of the movement is no longer possible."

The findings are published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy

TAKE THAT, AI !
HUMANS RULE, STILL!

HUMAN FREE WILL...BOTH A WONDERFUL THING AND ONE OF OUR BIGGEST PROBLEMS.
THE MIND SAYS, "NO, DON'T DO IT, YOU'LL BE SORRY!" AND FREE WILL SAYS, "SHUDDUP! I DO AS I PLEASE!"

AND THAT'S HOW WE GOT "DARWIN AWARDS". 

BUT, IT'S ALSO HOW WE GOT 'REVOLUTIONS', WON CIVIL RIGHTS, AND HOW WE JUST MAY YET TAKE BACK ALL WE LOST AFTER 9/11, AFTER FDR'S CREATION OF A "WELFARE STATE", AFTER COMING UNDER THE RULE OF A "LEAGUE OF NATIONS (aka, THE U.N.) AND HOW WE JUST MIGHT PULL OFF GETTING BACK TO THAT GLORIOUS PROMISE...

"...A GOVERNMENT OF THE PEOPLE, FOR THE PEOPLE, BY THE PEOPLE..."

BUT NOT SUCH AS THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT WOULD HAVE US BELIEVE...THEY ARE NOT, IN ANY WAY, "OF, FOR, OR BY THE PEOPLE"... QUITE THE OPPOSITE!

SO, ENDING ON THE THEME OF FREE WILL VERSUS ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE, WHAT BETTER EXAMPLE OF ARTIFICIAL, AS IN NOT REAL, INTELLIGENCE THAN THE SELF-SERVING GOVERNMENT NONE OF US HAD A HAND IN ESTABLISHING...WELL, EXCEPT BY ALLOWING IT AND "VOTING" FOR IT...


WHO SAID THIS? A  State is an organization that always is manned by an elite bent on domination for its own purposes. Its powers are not unlimited, but their expansion can become exceedingly uncomfortable for those forced to submit to them or who mistakenly support them. When the elite poses as a popular movement or the democratic voice of the people or the leadership of the general will or the vanguard of the people, it is at its most dangerous for then it possesses a rationale that may result in the acquiescence of large numbers of its subjects who tie their own nooses.

The statists want a pliant and acquiescent people, not an active thinking people that questions the State or its constantly increasing encroachments. Witness the State’s reactions to the Occupy movement and to Assange, Manning and Snowden. "

MAY I ADD, WITNESS THE HURRIED ATTEMPT, THE MASSIVE SPENDING TO FIND A WAY TO "OUT-COMPUTE" AND TO BRIDLE AND MANIPULATE THE HUMAN MIND AND THE HUMAN WILL. 


ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE IS NO MATCH FOR A HUMAN  MIND, BUT WE MUST BE DILIGENT TO KEEP BOTH OUR WONDERFUL MINDS AND OUR FREE WILL CLEAR AND UNIMPEDED BY DISTRACTIONS THAT MIGHT ROB US OF BOTH. 

ANYTHING THAT LESSENS OUR ABILITY TO THINK LOGICALLY, TO ASSESS SITUATIONS WITH REASON, TO DECIDE, EVEN IF IT MEANS A POOR DECISION, SHOULD SOUND ALARMS THAT HELP US "RAISE SHIELDS" AND NEVER, EVER BECOME THAT TOTALLY SUBMISSIVE "HIVE".

ALL GREAT MINDS OF PLANET EARTH, I SALUTE YOU.

MAY YOU THRIVE AND BE ALWAYS FOUND WITH FREE WILL INTACT.