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Turing Test Competition At CalTech
Charles Dodgeson writes "The Turing Tournament at Cal Tech wants to
know if you
can program an emulator that will play games like a
human, or if can you write detector that can correctly sort the wetware from the software.
Before you get too excited, the "games" are very limited things. But there is a $10,000 prize for the winner. You can read the gory
details."
Would someone please translate this to something than can be parsed by non-math types?
Just make it run around shooting stuff and saying things like "lol u camping fagot!!!!" ;)
Oh, and "my new vidcadr r0x ur world".
Honey, I shrunk the Cygwin
According to The Jargon Dictionary wetware is:
/wet'weir/ n. [prob. from the novels of Rudy Rucker] 1. The human nervous system, as opposed to computer hardware or software. "Wetware has 7 plus or minus 2 temporary registers." 2. Human beings (programmers, operators, administrators) attached to a computer system, as opposed to the system's hardware or software. See liveware, meatware.
wetware
I didn't know what it meant... figured other people may not either.
sig.
...if you can program an emulator that will play games like a human...
What? You mean make a bot to miss every shot using the railgun in Quake 3? I think I can whip up some AI for ya!
"The Turing Tournament is a two sided tournament designed to find, on the one hand, the best computer programs to mimic human behavior"
:-)
humanator2()
{
while (sex=="false")
for (0:ii:4294967296) {
if (ii mod 100!=0) {
call dwnld_porn(kiddie);
else
call mstrbte();
end;
ii++;
}
}
Note the function requires no parameters...and eventually self-destructs
-Chris
--an unbreakable toy is useful for breaking other toys--
From the site:
... ... ...
:-(
An emulator is computer program that takes as input a stage game file, and gives as output a dataset file.
The input file is in the file game.nfg, and the output file should be written in the file dataset.txt, both of which should reside in the same directory as the executable program. Note that the file game.nfg will be written into each emulator's directory by the tournament program prior to running your emulator.
This is exactly the way ACM ICPC contests are conducted, except that if the systems crash for any reason, you're not given extra time to make up for it
And sadly, from the site:
Languages supported:
The computer program that you submit (for either an emulator or a detector) must be written in a combination of one or more of the following languages:
C or C++
java
Perl
Mathematica
Gambit GCL
I would have expected them to atleast add shell-scripting to this - very useful under such conditions to do some Q&D work, or would be taken for granted that since the shell can be a part of the OS, you are free to use it?
Also, would have been nice if they'd added Python to the list, and more importantly Forth (yes, despite what you've heard, Forth is indeed useful, just look at Arthur T Murray's Mind Project).
As someone who spent a lot of time working with an actual Turing Test bot, I'd just like to say that the term "Turing Test" really only applies to a "conversation" between computers and people, not emulating behavior in games, etc. I mean, when Turing wrote Computing Machinery and Intelligence, this isn't really what he envisioned to be a Turing Test.
From what I could gather, this is a lot closer to a programming tournament rather than a Turing Test...
I never understood this. Why would I want a computer that ridicules my hair, dress, and generally pathetic life? If I wanted that, I'd just get married!
Alito: A vote for Alito is a punch in the eye to put that bitch back in her place!
REM HUMAN V2.3
10 BUILD STUFF
20 WANT MORE STUFF
30 BUILD MORE STUFF
40 WANT STUFF YOU CANT HAVE
50 BUILD WEAPONS TO TAKE STUFF FROM WHO DOES HAVE
60 GAIN ENEMIES
70 BUILD BIGGER WEAPONS FOR DEFENSE
80 BUILD SUPER WEAPON
90 DESTROY SELVES
99 GOTO 10
--an unbreakable toy is useful for breaking other toys--
Amazing. They are having an AI tournament, and their supported language list includes C, C++, Java, Perl, Mathematica, and something called the Gambit Command Language.
Where the hell are the good AI languages? Functional languages? Lisp? Scheme? Caml? SML? Hell, I'd settle for Python.
Justin Dubs
The game has been defined. It's fairly classic payoff matrix used in game theory. Look up the Prisoner's Dilemma (http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/bb/pd.html) problem. The goal of the game is maximize your outcome (while minimizing the opponent's).
I don't think Caltech is the best place to determine what is "human" behavior.
Life at Caltech.
Also, notice that this contest is being held by the "Division of Humanities and Social Sciences".
This 'contest' reminds of the scene in Ghostbusters where Bill Murray manipulates pre-cog cards to get women. Really, if a ESP buff were to present something like this to the Amazing Randi he would not accept it on the grounds that it was too easy to manipulate.
First and foremost, there is a large sum of money being bandied around. The participants are incented to win by monetary payouts, and two payouts of $10,000 dollars are at stake as well. When games with this high of stakes are being played, great caution is generally used by the house.
But look at the rules of the game...there basically are none. Participants are identified by e-mail address; no rule is specified about the number of entries per person. Also, no rule is specified about collusion between entrants (detectors and emulators). It doesn't take an einstein to figure out how to bias the results of the experient by making enough colluding entries. It is funny this, given that the games themselves are *about* collusion. Its a joke.
Next, notice that there really isnt any way for anybody to tell if the results of the experiement are meaningful, or if they have been manipulated. Its not based on a falsafible proposition and is not scientific. Its no different from any method used by psychic hoaxers of the past. The creators of the 'contest' can manipulate the data, and direct the winnings to their confederates.
Finally, the bizarre nature of the contest should raise some flags. They are giving out $10,000 for a program that would have been hacked together in a couple of months at most. What kind of value could you expect from a contest like this?
As a recent alum (2002), I can shed some light on some things.
:-) )
Why is this in the Deparment of Humanities and Social Sciences?
From the URL, this Tournament is being run by the Social Sciences Experimental Laboratory (SSEL), not the CS department. The SSEL has been one of the leaders in experimental economics research (read: actually testing all those crazy theories you hear in economics classes).
Why is there money involved?
All experiments by the SSEL involve money. As an undergraduate, I participated in many experiments, mostly involving trading "commodities" in simple (and sometimes not-so-simple) markets. We were paid based on our performance. If I had an off night, I got paid $5 for 2 hours of the experiment. If I had a good night, I could make upwards of $80. Yes folks, this is real money we're talking about here. Since the point is to test people's economic thinking, you must make your decisions based on a real outcome, otherwise the data gathered is invalid.
Why then are they doing this test?
I don't work for the SSEL (and never have), but here's why I think they're doing this: Since they're interested in not only individual human behavior, but also how individuals interact and make choices based on the actions of other individuals, it would be useful to design a computer program that mimics other human's behavior. If other humans think this program acts like a human, then you can do two things: you can take the specifications of the computer program and figure out what qualities of the program humans have. As well, you can then replace humans with the computer program in real experiments (this not only allows you to test the limits of the program, but also to save money
And as an alum (who was not too fond of his time there, but still feels compelled to defend Caltech), it's *Caltech*, not *Cal Tech* or *Cal-Tech* (but if you're feeling lazy, *caltech* is all right too).
nak
The only game I want to play is Global Thermonuclear War.