Department of Computing Science, Fall 2010

Artificially Intelligent Behavior

Problems with Classical Artificial Intelligence

By Erik Billing

Department of Computing Science, Fall 2010

New Homework on Monday!
Write down one topic/question that you find interesting
and that you want me to bring up during Lecture 5. The
topic/question should something from Chapter 4 of
Pfeifer and Scheier.

Due May 13, 8.00

Questions
• Why is the Traveling Salesman Problem so popular in AI?
• Elaborate the difference between agent simulation and
classical simulation
Traveling salesman problem
• A salesman is about to visit a number of cities
• He wants to visit each city at least once
• He wants to travel the shortest distance possible

• A Classical problem in AI
– Because it’s very hard (NP-hard)
• The complexity of a exhaustive search if TSP is
O(n!)
– I.e., the time it takes to search all
combinations increases exponentially with the
number of cities (n)
TSP with Ants

• Ants run around

randomly searching
for food
• When they find food
they leave a phero-
mone trace on their
way back to the nest
• The trace makes this route more attractive to
other ants, which in turn leave their own trace
making the route even more attractive
• Since ants taking a short route will fetch food
faster than ants taking a longer route, the
trace of the short route will become stronger
TSP Comparison
TSP by Search TSP by Ants
• Typical example of • Typical agent-based
Classical AI approach
• It requires a • It could be implemented
representation of the physically without a
world representation
• Sequential • Parallel
• Guarantees an optimal • Solution is emergent
solution (may be suboptimal)
• Clear stopping condition • No stopping condition
• All or nothing • Robust and fault
tolerant

See article Ant Colony System on the course page

(under extra readings in the literature list)
Questions
• Give another example of the frame problem
The frame problem
• How to keep a model of the world (a
representation) up to date?
• Essentially, anything can happen at any time
– How to sport out the relevant possibilities
form completely irrelevant ones?
• R1 – The sleeping dog
– Everything has to be made explicit
• R1D1
– Consider everything
• R2D1
– Sort out relevant consequences to consider
The frame problem - Solution
Symbol grounding
• In GOFAI, intelligence is the manipulation of
symbols
• Symbols
– Are defined within a symbol system
– Have relations to other symbols
– Refer to an object in the outer world
(referent)
– There are rules of how these symbols may be
combined

• How do we connect the symbol with its referent?

Symbol grounding
• Example:
– Four symbols {1, 2, +, 3}
– Combine the symbols 1 + 2
– Produces the symbol 3

• A human will interpret the “meaning” of the

symbol 3 in relation to the specific problem we
are trying to solve
Symbol grounding
• Example
– Four symbols {CUP, DRINK FULL, EMPTY}
– Combine: CUP FULL DRINK
– Produces: CUP EMPTY

• A human can interpret the meaning of this

example and apply it in a specific situation
– How do we implement this ability in a robot?
Symbol grounding
Further problems
• How do an agent create new symbols?
• How do an agent decide what a symbol should
refer to before the relation is there?
– Remember, symbols are the mechanism of
intelligence, we can’t refer to some other
mechanism without breaking the Physical
Symbol System Hypothesis
• How do the agent change the ontology
– The ontology is the boundary of what the
agent can represent (i.e., know)
Symbol grounding
GIFAI Conclusion Embodied Conclusion

Humans can do Humans can not be

symbol grounding symbol processing
so it must be systems
possible
Questions
• Do “true” intelligence require a biological
system?
• Central processing is a reason for delays
– Can we use more powerful processors?
– What about real-time processing?
More Questions
You showed us in class some agents that behaved
according to some basic rules. When I saw the
graphics that were simulating a population my
question came up:
– All the programmed robots/agents used to
model and predict financial behaviours (stock
exchange market, forex exchange market...)
are based in the same concept of "basic" rules
of the ones we saw in class?
Questions: Intelligence
• If I am not wrong, in class, you said that IQ tests
could say pretty much if someone is intelligent.
– Which aspects of intelligence does an IQ test
measure? And how does it measures them?
• Are a virus intelligent since it can adapt to it’s
environment and maximize it’s energy?
• Why does some defintions of intelligence include
the influence of and adaption to the enviroment
and others do not? How can one argue that
intelligence is independent from environmental
adaption?
• Why does creativity have to be related to
emotions?
Questions: Searching
• Explain Depth-limited search and in which
situations it’s useful
• What happens to a search problem on a map
when you have modern GPS technology, current
traffics information on roads and so on?
Consciousness
• “that the role of consciousness in mental life is
very small, almost frighteningly so. The aspects
of mental life that require consciousness have
turned out to be a relatively minor fraction of the
business of the brain''
– I think it seems a bit exaggerated. What does
it mean bye "Mental life"?

• The book states that consciousness is something

we with certainty only can attribute to humans
– Where does this statement come from and is
this really a common belief (especially in the
scientific society)?