LONDON (Reuters) – Watch out scientists -- you may be replaced by a robot.
Two teams of researchers said on Thursday they had created machines that could reason, formulate theories and discover scientific knowledge on their own, marking a major advance in the field ofartificial intelligence.
Such robo-scientists could be put to work unraveling complex biological systems, designing new drugs, modeling the world's climate or understanding the cosmos.
For the moment, though, they are performing more humble tasks.
At Aberystwyth University in Wales, Ross King and colleagues have created a robot called Adam that can not only carry out experiments on yeast metabolism but also reason about the results and plan the next experiment.
It is the world's first example of a machine that has made an independent scientific discovery -- in this case, new facts about the genetic make-up of baker's yeast.
"On its own it can think of hypotheses and then do the experiments, and we've checked that it's got the results correct," King said in an interview.
"People have been working on this since the 1960s. When we first sent robots to Mars, they really dreamt of the robots doing their own experiments on Mars. After 40 or 50 years, we've now got the capability to do that."
Their next robot, Eve, will have much more brain power and will be put to work searching for new medicines.
King hopes the application of intelligent robotic thinking to the process of sifting tens of thousands of compounds for potential new drugs will be particularly valuable in the hunt for treatments for neglected tropical diseases like malaria.
King published his findings in the journal Science, alongside a second paper from Hod Lipson and Michael Schmidt of Cornell University in New York, who have developed a computer program capable of working out the fundamental physical laws behind a swinging double pendulum.
Just by crunching the numbers -- and without any prior instruction in physics -- the Cornell machine was able to decipher Isaac Newton's laws of motion and other properties.
Lipson does not think robots will make scientists obsolete any day soon, but believes they could take over much of the routine work in research laboratories.
"One of the biggest problems in science today is finding the underlying principles in areas where there are lots and lots of data," he told reporters in a conference call. "This can help in accelerating the rate at which we can discover scientific principles behind the data."
I find it frightening and symbolic that they've named them Adam and Eve. I guess this answers the question as to whether or not God would find it offensive.
ReplyDeleteI don't know, I find it significant that they would call them Adam and Eve....shows you they are at least THINKING about God's "creation"...and they are at least the first "created" robots...Key word here being "robots"....Would God find this offensive?? I don't know...I'm not quite sure what I think about this yet...It might be a wonder thing if they really CAN speed up research on medications and research etc. etc.....they are after all only glorified computers aren't they?? I really don't know...Need to dwell on this one..
ReplyDeleteThey are computers, nothing more. For now.
ReplyDeletePS - I doubt God is offended they named it Adam. Any more than he's offended I'm named John.
ReplyDeleteDoes that robot move around and use it's hands? Does it talk?
ReplyDeleteYes, it moves and uses its hands.
ReplyDeleteIt also comes up with ideas, performs experiments to test the ideas, and submits the results if it is successful.
I don't know if it actually audibly talks, but obviously it can transmit data.
Offended wasn't the right word. I'm having a hard time putting my finger on what it would be...my point being that they obviously put themselves at the level of God by naming these the same way that God named his first creations. In fact, do you suppose there is a part of them that considers their creation superior?
ReplyDeleteI don't think they named them Adam and Eve to put themselves on the same level as God, I think they named them that because they were the first.
ReplyDeleteAnd no, I highly doubt anyone thinks these things are superior to humans. At this point, they're drastically behind humans in almost every regard.