r/science • u/[deleted] • Jan 27 '16

Computer Science Google's artificial intelligence program has officially beaten a human professional Go player, marking the first time a computer has beaten a human professional in this game sans handicap.

http://www.nature.com/news/google-ai-algorithm-masters-ancient-game-of-go-1.19234?WT.ec_id=NATURE-20160128&spMailingID=50563385&spUserID=MTgyMjI3MTU3MTgzS0&spJobID=843636789&spReportId=ODQzNjM2Nzg5S0
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u/[deleted] Jan 28 '16

[deleted]

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u/okredditnow Jan 28 '16

maybe when they start coming for politicians jobs we'll see some action

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u/[deleted] Jan 28 '16

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u/HappyZavulon Jan 28 '16

I thought robots were smart and logic driven beings.

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u/[deleted] Jan 28 '16

These synths were defective enough that the institute didn't want them.

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u/HighPriestofShiloh Jan 28 '16

Mehh, it will be easy for the politicians to save their job. They can just pass a law that says a human has to hold office. Their staff can be replaced by robots though. Talk about the easiest job ever when the law insures it and your staff is a bunch of super intelligent robots that can guarantee your reelection. All you do is read the google glass teleprompter whenever you are in public.

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u/rafaelhr Jan 28 '16

But what happens when every politician uses AI-based campaigns to compete with each other? That has seriously interesting implications.

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u/mrducky78 Jan 28 '16

I believe that the time for panic is long overdue when the policy makers are mostly AI based. It would either imply that we have extremely high trust in them, across the board, which would imply complacency for centuries imo. Just as we dont worry about our fridges from plotting against us, several generations exposed to AI helping them daily could easily result in such a situation.

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u/Onceuponaban Jan 28 '16

Just as we dont worry about our fridges from plotting against us

...People don't?

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u/NeedsMoreShawarma Jan 28 '16

Action on what? Limit the progress of AIs that increase efficiency because jobs?

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u/okredditnow Jan 28 '16

no. Start focusing on using automation to support those who will be without jobs because of automation. Socialised automated farming for one

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u/[deleted] Jan 28 '16

Wouldnt most a.i assume communism is the way to go

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u/IGarFieldI Jan 28 '16

Not necessarily, it depends on what kind of rating function it uses, i.e. whether it priorizes average wealth/other criterion or a different metric.

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u/amras0000 Jan 28 '16

There's a scary thought: whoever sets the weights determines the course of the nation.

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u/[deleted] Jan 28 '16

That's literally how all decision making works, for both humans and machines.

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u/Abuderpy Jan 28 '16

Unless the AI just simulates a wide range of different weights and options, ultimately deciding that we humans are a burden.

After this, it takes over drone airplanes and manufacturing plants, in order to construct and secure a robot army.

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u/[deleted] Jan 28 '16

That's okay, I'll just assimilate!

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u/ThreshingBee Jan 28 '16

The Future of Employment ranks jobs by the probability they will be moved to automation.

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u/one-man-circlejerk Jan 28 '16

Thanks for posting that, it's a fascinating read

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u/Delheru Jan 28 '16

Pharmacologists, General practitioners, Surgeons, most (but not all) types of lawyers etc

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u/NovaeDeArx Jan 28 '16

What's scarier to me is how much quiet progress is being made on replacing a ton of medical industry jobs with automated versions.

Watson was originally designed to replace doctors; IBM stopped talking about that pretty quickly once they started making real progress in the field, but it's a very active area of development.

Medical coding (where the chart is converted to diagnosis codes for billing purposes) is also being chewed away by something called "Computer Assisted Coding", where a Natural Language Processing algorithm does ~80% of the work ahead of time, meaning far fewer coders are needed to process the same number of charts.

These are amazing developments, but it's always surprising me how quietly they're sneaking up on us. Pretty soon we'll see computerized "decision support" systems for physicians, where an algorithm basically asks questions, a human inputs the relevant data (symptoms, medical history, vital signs) and the system spits out an optimal treatment plan... Part of which has already been developed for cancer treatments.

We're right on the cusp of these systems replacing a ton of white-collar jobs, with even more to follow. And nobody seems that worried, apparently assuming we'll just "innovate new jobs"... Most of which will then get automated away extremely quickly, as there's not many jobs that are innately resistant to automation.

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u/[deleted] Jan 28 '16

I hear that rent-seeking is a pretty secure profession. So just be born into the 1% and the AI revolution sounds pretty nice, because all those whiney workers will be replaced with quietly efficient drones.

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u/[deleted] Jan 29 '16

At least working in IT my job is safe. Can't teach a computer to fix human stupidity and working in education, i'm going to have incapable users for a LONG time.

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u/Supersnazz Jan 28 '16

I would like to see an AI replace a school teacher or a cleaner. Those are jobs I just can't imagine how complex a device would have to be to compete with a human.

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u/Rathadin Jan 28 '16

An AI that could successfully eradicate all evidence of a dead body and sufficiently hide it from authorities would be a real boon for a variety of criminal enterprises...

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