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AI Is in a 'Golden Age' and Solving Problems That Were Once Sci-fi, Amazon CEO Says (yahoo.com)

Posted by msmash on from the people-in-power dept.

An anonymous reader writes: Artificial intelligence (AI) development has seen an "amazing renaissance" and is beginning to solve problems that were once seen as science fiction, according to Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos. Machine learning, machine vision, and natural language processing are all strands of AI that are being developed by technology giants such as Amazon, Alphabet's Google, and Facebook for various uses. These AI developments were praised by the Amazon founder. "It is a renaissance, it is a golden age," Bezos told an audience at the Internet Association's annual gala last week. "We are now solving problems with machine learning and artificial intelligence that were in the realm of science fiction for the last several decades. And natural language understanding, machine vision problems, it really is an amazing renaissance." Bezos called AI an "enabling layer" that will "improve every business."

8 of 99 comments (clear)

  1. Easy to say when it's not his job on the line. by sethstorm · · Score: 4, Insightful

    For the most of us, AI is trouble ahead that needs to be stopped and slowed down.

    Perhaps Mr. Bezos should read a bit of Herbert's Dune to know what happens when you let technological progress go unchecked. The end result is worse than what it would be if humanity were included.

    --
    Twitter supports and protects racists - by smearing their critics with the "Hate Speech" label.
    1. Re:Easy to say when it's not his job on the line. by sethstorm · · Score: 2

      The key takeaway is not whether we'll have thinking machines, but the consequences of unchecked automation.

      --
      Twitter supports and protects racists - by smearing their critics with the "Hate Speech" label.
    2. Re:Easy to say when it's not his job on the line. by Xest · · Score: 3, Insightful

      "At this time, it is entirely unclear whether "thinking machines" are even possible in this universe."

      Um, what do you think we as humans are? magic?

  2. hard by phantomfive · · Score: 2

    Once again, someone is talking about soft AI, and the reporter interprets it as hard AI, and mass confusion results. Expect follow-up stories about how AI will take over the world.

    --
    "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
    1. Re:hard by Cipheron · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Soft AI is still capable of building deathbots and the like, but it would lack conciousness. You can't reason with an anthill. Soft AI could well be more dangerous than hard AI.

    2. Re:hard by gweihir · · Score: 2

      Indeed. It seems tech reporters are severely lacking in real intelligence when it comes to reporting on AI.

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      Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
    3. Re:hard by freeze128 · · Score: 2

      Thanks to machine learning and A.I., voice assistants can accurately convert your speech into text. Unfortunately, they still are dumber than dirt, and have trouble COMPREHENDING things that even a 2 year old could. It's not artificial intelligence, it's artificial stupidity.

  3. Re:AI hardware by Tough+Love · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Right now, most of it runs on GPUs, and requires lots of them. GPUs weren't really made for that task and there is potential for efficiency gains.

    No, GPUs were made for a very similar task: parallel iamge processing. It is similar in the same way that your visual cortex, used for input, is arranged in much the same way as a GPU is, for output. The potential for efficiency gains from using GPUs better has barely been scratched. Sure, some special purpose code like s-expression evalutation can be accelerated by ASIC, but it would be a serious mistake to assume that is all there is to AI.

    --
    When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.