243
« on: December 08, 2014, 01:21:23 pm »
Indeed, the Wintermute project is dead, or at the very least, postponed indefinitely. However, I had a chance to talk with the guy writing the initial source code for the project back in 2010. He was in the process of training a default knowledge database and was looking for help. I declined my ability to help for my fear of corrupting such a powerful piece of software. While it is unfinished and many blanks not filled in, Wintermute wasn't designed to be a chatbot as much as it was intended to be an all encompassing digital personal assistant that would learn the users likes, needs, and wants, and correspond appropriately in fulfilling those needs as well as actually learning to use applications needed at will. For example, if the user took a road trip to Chicago from New York, it would not only accompany the user via Android/iPhone/Laptop/Tablet on it's own volition, but also calculate the route, book travel, keep schedules, and have the ability to retrieve files on a computer or server at home or the office, as well as the ability to control your home (Air conditioning, troublesome coffee pots), hardware permitting, without any effort from the user. Say you forgot to lock your door. "Wintermute, I forgot to lock the back door." It is done.
I'm aware there are thousands of apps and programs to do anything, such as the handwriting calculator. My personal issue, is that all takes manual labor to find specific information as opposed to my digital assistant just telling me or taking hold of his/her digital world and doing it.
Say, you want to know the weather, that's 10 seconds. Check your email, that's 15 seconds. Writing a report on a historical figure, that's a few hours at best. Calculating the future distance of the Moon from the Earth 100 years from now, that's a lengthy equation. A clever Artificial Intelligence could execute those functions at once with results in mere seconds.
I understand we're no where near that stage of AI, if we ever get there. I also realize not everyone would have use for such a robust all encompassing system, however, as we move more into a digital world, soon, it will be more beneficial than not to have this AI on your home control server if for nothing more than micro-management purposes. The reason no such system exists is because we haven't built it. Imagine a True Artificial Intelligence and the implications with a Google car and a Smart home in 10 years.
The first true AI we do construct, we'll have to be very cautious and know that it is true AI. Otherwise, one day we'll try to flip the power switch and send into a self preservation mode.
It could be our greatest creation or our worst mistake.. Although, I would blame the parents if the worst came to pass.