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The Baby Bootstrap?

Posted by Cliff on from the skynet-anyone dept.

An anonymous reader asks: "Slashdot recently covered a story that DARPA would significantly cut CS research. When I was completing graduate work in AI, the 'baby bootstrap' was considered the holy grail of military applications. Simply put, the 'baby bootstrap' would empower a computing device to learn like a child with a very good memory. DARPA poured a small fortune into the research. No sensors, servos or video input - it only needed terminal I/O to be effective. Today the internet could provide a developmental database far beyond any testbed that we imagined, yet there has been no significant progress in over 30 years. MindPixels and Cycorp seem typical of poorly funded efforts headed in the wrong direction, and all we hear from DARPA is autonomous robots. NIST seems more interested in industrial applications. Even Google is remarkably void of anything about the 'baby bootstrap'. What went wrong? Has the military really given up on this concept, or has their research moved to other, more classified levels?"

15 of 435 comments (clear)

  1. Oh great... by kwoo · · Score: 3, Funny

    Just one problem with this kind of research...

    For the first year I'll be up every two hours all night, tending to the system.

    Actually, that may be better than just being up all night, like I am now.

    --
    unixkb.com -- articles on practical Unix issues.
  2. Classified by pete-classic · · Score: 5, Funny

    It has moved to more classified levels.

    I'd go into more detail, but the C.I.A. and C.I.D are at my door. Ooh, the B.A.T.F. just pulled up in a Mother's Cookies truck!

    -Peter

    1. Re:Classified by sgant · · Score: 3, Funny

      But they all ran when they saw the RIAA and MPAA moving in...even the IRS is afraid of them.

      Tremble as they pass...stare in awe at their mighty power

      --

      "Leo Fender was in a 'state of grace' when he designed the Stratocaster." -- Paul Reed Smith
    2. Re:Classified by sys$manager · · Score: 4, Funny

      And you wondered why there was a

      Flowers
      By
      Irene

      truck parked on your street all week?

  3. It's obvious why the search failed by exp(pi*sqrt(163)) · · Score: 5, Funny

    Who calls what you describe "baby boostrap"? I haven't worked in AI myself but have a keen interest in it and have friends who worked in the field including one who worked on Cyc (who says it's a scam BTW). Not once have I ever heard the expression "baby bootstrap". But what you've done is cool. Rather than search on precisely that term you've submitted your search to the serach engine known as "/. readership". It's not terribly relaible but it is good at fuzzy searches like yours.

    --
    Doesn't it make you feel good to know that our freedoms are protected by politicans, lawyers and journalists.
    1. Re:It's obvious why the search failed by Dun+Malg · · Score: 4, Funny
      Who calls what you describe "baby boostrap"?

      I've also noticed that nobody seems to make Horseless Carriages anymore (and after they showed such promise). Likewise, the Difference Engine has been a total flop. I do, however, expect we will see in the future some use made of the Vegetable Lamb of Tartary, though no use has been made of it in the last 1000 years since it was discovered.

      --
      If a job's not worth doing, it's not worth doing right.
  4. Baby Bootstrap? by ArcCoyote · · Score: 4, Funny

    The process that bootstraps a baby is still the Holy Grail for a lot of geeks.

  5. Baby Bootstrap by multipartmixed · · Score: 3, Funny

    I can assure you.. I am very classified.

    --

    Do daemons dream of electric sleep()?
  6. Shutting down this discussion as of now. by infonography · · Score: 4, Funny

    By order of Wintermute (DARPA AI code 324326343.534) this discussion is terminated and no further investigation into this obviously false and misleading theory is permitted.

    Would you like to play a game of chess Professor Falken?

    --
    Sorry about the writing. Robot fingers, you know? Cliff Steele in DOOM PATROL #23
  7. Re:Stat algos by phreakmonkey · · Score: 4, Funny

    You're going to take this answer from someone who enters their comments on a Commodore 64?

  8. What Went Wrong? by SQL+Error · · Score: 4, Funny

    there has been no significant progress in over 30 years

    That's what went wrong. Basically, it don't work.

  9. Re:The Terminator by randomErr · · Score: 3, Funny

    No, they're afraid the computer may ask 'Want to play a game?'

    --
    You say things that offend me and I can deal with it. Can you?
  10. Nonono! by jd · · Score: 5, Funny

    They ARE a Commodore 64 that got "baby bootstrapped" off the Internet. This is a bid to prevent competition.

    --
    It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
  11. Whale's intelligence by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

    A whale can't go on Slashdot and say "OMGZ first post guys" much less something of human level intelligence.

    Yet again, more proof that whales are smarter than humans. :-)
    --
    AC

  12. They're still working on artificial stupidity... by Fubari · · Score: 5, Funny
    excerpted from here:
    Computer scientist Arthur Boran was ecstatic.
    A few minutes earlier, he had programmed a
    basic mathematical problem into his
    prototypical Akron I computer.
    His request was simply, "Give me the
    sum of every odd number between
    zero and ten.    "
    The computer's quick answer, 157, was
    unexpected, to say the least. With growing
    excitement, Boran requested an explanation
    of the computer's reasoning.
    The printout read as follows:
    THE TERM "ODD NUMBER" IS AMBIGUOUS. I
    THEREFORE CHOOSE TO INTERPRET IT AS MEANING
    "A NUMBER THAT IS FUNNY LOOKING."
    USING MY AESTHETIC JUDGEMENT, I PICKED THE
    NUMBERS 3, 8, AND 147, ADDED THEM UP,
    AND GOT 157.

    A few moments later there was an addendum:
    I GUESS I MEANT 158.

    Followed shortly thereafter by:
    147 IS MORE THAN 10, ISN'T IT? SORRY.

    Anyone doing conventional research would
    have undoubtedly consigned the hapless
    computer to the scrap heap. But for Boran,
    the Akron I's response represented a
    startling breakthrough in a little-known
    field: artificial stupidity.
    Boran is the head of NASA, the National
    Artificial Stupidity Association ("Not to
    be confused with those space people,"
    he is quick to point out), a loosely-knit
    band of computer-school dropouts currently
    occupying an abandoned fraternity house
    at the University of New Mexico.