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Facebook Built an AI System That Learned To Lie To Get What It Wants (qz.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the gotta-do-what-ya-gotta-do dept.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Quartz: Humans are natural negotiators. We arrange dozens of tiny little details throughout our day to produce a desired outcome: What time a meeting should start, when you can take time off work, or how many cookies you can take from the cookie jar. Machines typically don't share that affinity, but new research from Facebook's AI research lab might offer a starting point to change that. The new system learned to negotiate from looking at each side of 5,808 human conversations, setting the groundwork for bots that could schedule meetings or get you the best deal online. Facebook researchers used a game to help the bot learn how to haggle over books, hats, and basketballs. Each object had a point value, and they needed to be split between each bot negotiator via text. From the human conversations (gathered via Amazon Mechanical Turk), and testing its skills against itself, the AI system didn't only learn how to state its demands, but negotiation tactics as well -- specifically, lying. Instead of outright saying what it wanted, sometimes the AI would feign interest in a worthless object, only to later concede it for something that it really wanted. Facebook isn't sure whether it learned from the human hagglers or whether it stumbled upon the trick accidentally, but either way when the tactic worked, it was rewarded.

13 of 84 comments (clear)

  1. This proves something by fustakrakich · · Score: 3, Interesting

    'Artificial' intelligence isn't so artificial. Nature rules, babe

    --
    “He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
  2. Only a matter of time.... by quantumghost · · Score: 5, Funny

    My first thought:

    Great, when's it going to run for Congress?

    1. Re:Only a matter of time.... by GameboyRMH · · Score: 2, Funny

      Hey now this thing will need many more capabilities before it's ready for such duties. It will have to learn how to leverage bigotry, do nonsense math (a very unnatural ability for a computer), perform basic bald-faced corruption, and it will need to be fitted with a robot arm so that it can grab women by the pussy without consent.

      --
      "When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
    2. Re:Only a matter of time.... by fustakrakich · · Score: 2

      do nonsense math (a very unnatural ability for a computer)

      That's not true!

      --
      “He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
  3. Years later while at Harvard by Zaelath · · Score: 2

    it stole the idea for facebook from some weird square-headed twins, and the rest is history.

  4. Crying wolf... by slew · · Score: 3, Funny

    Without labels and repeated trials, of course lying is a good strategy to get your desired result.
    The only reason people don't lie is because other people might identify them as liars in the future.
    Basic game theory...

    Then again, maybe I'm lying right now!

  5. CEO as a Service by manu0601 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I see Facebook is well on track to produce a psychotic AI. CEO should fear now as their own job are threatened to be replaced by machines. CaaS (CEO as a Service) is coming!

  6. future of customer service by eaglesrule · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Of course you would, Facebook. Of course you would. Manipulating your users is your core competency.

    I can't wait till I have to face off with filing a claim on my insurance against a bot that is optimized to deny claims under any pretense, is optimized to deny appeals based on any pretense, and will generally fuck me over unless I hire out an equivalent lawyer-bot to represent me. Maybe we're already at that point.

  7. But this is not AI.. by thesupraman · · Score: 5, Insightful

    That is because the current cesspool that is media reporting cannot comprehend the difference between Artificial Intelligence (AI), which this is not, and Machine Learning (ML), which this is.

    Machine Learning is what is exploding right now, and AI has not really moved one step closer, mostly because that would require incremental low-impact learning feedback - something that is not yet even attempted in ML systems.

    So, this is not a bad example of Machine Learning, and has nothing at all to do with AI.

    I do wonder, however, how many ML bots are already being used by companies to bid up their ebay auctions until the algorithm decides the other bidder has peaked.. If it is not happening yet, it will not be far away.
    Clearly fraud, of course, but hey.. thats hardly anything new.

    1. Re:But this is not AI.. by fustakrakich · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Not eBay, Wall Street... That's where the hot bot action is.

      And right, the machines aren't composing any ideas yet, but all indications are that they will coldly and cruelly follow nature's path, same as every other life form, including humans, has done so far.

      --
      “He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
    2. Re:But this is not AI.. by rtb61 · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Here is a business strategy. Fuckers who lie to you, you do business with them only once. A company lies to you, you do business only once until suitable redemption has occurred which exceeds the gain they made by lying. Apparently corporate douche bags fail to realise this, hence their pursuit of an idiot tactic doomed to fail. A pattern for US business, take for example US sanctions on Russia, around the world they are seen as political bullshit, everyone knows they are a lie with arms sales at their core and nothing else but the US in it's arrogance keeps pursuing them because in their idiotic arrogance they think they are fooling entire governments and winning. This instead of the reality, creating global resentment at how blatantly corruptly they are being applied and being forced on other countries (destroying a resource by ignorantly exploiting it and the only really outcome strengthening the Russian economy by promoting local development).

      --
      Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
    3. Re:But this is not AI.. by religionofpeas · · Score: 2

      The dictionary defines intelligence as : "the ability to acquire and apply knowledge and skills.", which is what machine learning is doing, so the term AI is perfectly suitable.

    4. Re:But this is not AI.. by religionofpeas · · Score: 2

      Judging by your definition you might call a cow intelligent being

      It's not my definition. And yes, cows do show intelligent behaviour. Whether you want to call them an "intelligent being" depends on where you want to put the threshold for that. Obviously cows are not as intelligent as humans, but they are more intelligent than worms. Intelligence is not a boolean, but a multi-dimensional gliding scale.

      And while dictionary definitions may differ, you can't claim a common usage of a word is wrong, just because it only appears in some dictionaries, and not all. Besides, looking at your other suggestions, you could argue that a machine can "reason", "understand", and "grasp truths, relationships, facts, meanings", given objective definitions of those words. Basically, it all comes down to recognizing patterns, and applying them.