This section lists all blog posts, regardless of topic.
Speech recognition. etc.September 24, 2008
Ever since Meredith got home from Seattle and told me about "Grace", the AI that runs the Microsoft Home of the Future, (I love the name Grace as the name of an in-home AI agent!) I seem to be drawn in by the promise of creating a full spectrum AI system with the following components:
  | A speech recognition layer |
| A language parsing layer |
| A core knowledge representation |
| A deduction engine |
| A web interface for looking up well defined information such as the weather via web services |
| A voice synthesis layer |
And to top it all off:
A subtle, well designed microphone, speaker, and LCD installation in the kitchen.
I'm not really interested at this point in working on the voice recognition or voice synthesis layers, I just want a cheap, but easy to use and ultimately effective system.
Here are some fun use cases to think of:
| "Grace, what is the weather forecast for tomorrow"? |
|  | theweathernetwork.com would load on the LCD for Waterloo, ON. |
| | Grace would speak the weather forecast. |
| "Grace, how many new emails do I have?" |
| | My GMail account would load on the LCD. |
| | Grace would speak the number of unread emails. |
| "Grace, what time is it?" |
| | Grace would speak the current time. |
| "Grace, what is my Social Insurance Number?" |
| "Grace, what is aunt Beryl's phone number?" |
| "Grace, what is the police phone number?" |
A little bit more out there:
| "Grace, order meal #1 from swisschalet.com" |
| | Grace would speak the details of meal #1 and ask for confirmation. |
| | Grace would speak an update once the meal was ordered, and would indicate the expected delivery time. |
etc. How fun would that be to tinker with!
Intelligence VS LearningSeptember 24, 2008
Something that I'm debating in my mind is the connection between intelligence and learning. The reason I ask is that many of the comprehensive AI efforts out there are based on producing a system that can learn as a means for achieving intelligence.
My intuition, on the other hand, is that this approach is like trying to run before you can walk. (I'm not convinced of this, but it's a premonition)
I feel that it should be easier to create a system that is intelligent, but has very limited learning capacity. A system such as this would surely require a lot of hand crafting, which would no doubt be very expensive, but ultimately much more attainable than a system that can simply learn from experience.
I think there's plenty of evidence against my assertion... I get the sense that many people have tried over the decades to create brittle, hand crafted systems, and failed, but I'm still tempted to think this is the way to go.
Three new songsSeptember 24, 2008
| Nerina Pallot |
| Goo Goo Dolls
Sometimes when I listen to secular bands I think of the lyrics in more Christian terms. "Let Love In" strikes me as something that could mean letting the loving sacrifice of Jesus transform you. |
| Avril Lavigne |
:)
older >>
