From: Jochen.Fromm@t-online.de   
      
   >   
   > I'm not saying good work hasn't been done, nor that useful derivatives   
   haven't   
   > been developed.  But to follow your analogy, we sought to build a car.   
   Instead,   
   > we built a coffee pot.  No doubt, it's useful.  But it's not a car, and   
   it's not   
   > much closer to being a car than was the hunk of plastic from which we   
   produced   
   > the coffee pot.   
   >   
      
   Yes, exactly, AI researchers tried to build a car,   
   but the most sophisticated system they were   
   able to build is a stupid tricycle with the   
   intelligence and power of a coffee pot. Will   
   we ever be able to create really autonomous   
   and intelligent agents ?   
      
   Natural intelligence has evolved in nature   
   to increase the fitness of agents in natural   
   environments. As artificial environments   
   are growing more and more realistic, and   
   virtual "Matrix" worlds appear, artificial   
   intelligence will emerge, too. It is only   
   a matter a time.   
      
   The question is if we can do it earlier, if   
   we can anticipate the important principles   
   now. I think yes, if the AI research community   
   would really work together. The community should   
   "keep the eye on the prize" (*), not on another coffee   
   pot or tricycle.   
      
   Trying to create agents with artificial intelligence   
   without complex, realistic artificial environments   
   produced by sophisticated virtual reality "game"   
   engines is like trying to build a plane or a rocket   
   without engine. That's what AI's founding fathers,   
   Marvin Minsky, John McCarthy, and Allen Newell   
   tried to do. But at least they always kept their eyes   
   on the prize, as Nils J. Nilsson (*) wrote.   
      
   We are able to produce complex, realistic artificial   
   environments, to use fast computers and big clusters,   
   so we should be able to create human-like behavior,   
   if we work together and keep the eye on the prize.   
      
   (*)   
   "Eye on the Prize"   
   Nils J. Nilsson,   
   AI Magazine Vol. 16   
   No. 2 (1995) 9-17   
   http://www.aaai.org/Library/Magazine/Vol16/16-02/vol16-02.html   
      
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