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The World's Biggest Spice Company is Using AI To Find New Flavors (cnn.com)
After 130 years, it can be hard to come up with new flavors, so the world's largest spice company is becoming the latest food producer to turn to artificial intelligence for help. From a report: McCormick -- the maker of Old Bay and other seasonings, spices and condiments -- hopes the technology can help it tantalize taste buds. It worked with IBM Research to build an AI system trained on decades worth of data about spices and flavors to come up with new flavor combinations. The Baltimore, Maryland-based company plans to bring its first batch of AI-assisted products to market later this year. The line of seasoning mixes, called One, for making one-dish meals, includes flavors such as Tuscan Chicken and Bourbon Pork Tenderloin. Hamed Faridi, McCormick's chief science officer, told CNN Business that using AI cuts down product development time, and that the company plans to use the technology to help develop all new products by the end of 2021.
Taste is a very subjective thing. What you like, I may not, what you think tastes unique may be totally blah for me.
Assuming you've worked out how to accurately get some electronic devices to "taste" something, how do you figure you are going to train some AI to come up with things that "taste" good to people?
AI is good at a lot of things, but fishing for subjective evaluations of things is not one of them. AI can evaluate and decide things for which there is an objective way to measure what's right, some times it can even make such decisions on less than what seems to be enough information. But how can you decide AI has created something good that is judged by subjective tests like how it tastes? Maybe your time would be better spend in the kitchen trying stuff? Oh that's right, AI let's you fire those folks with the promise that it can do everything they do, only cheaper.
If this goes too far and McCormick fires its test kitchen staff and army of tasters, it might be time to seriously consider shorting that stock.
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
AI though?!? Really, a company that deals in spice should know the Butlerian prohibition on thinking machines.
Thinking machines, what do such machines really do? They increase the number of things we can do without thinking. Things we do without thinking — there's the real danger.
-- Leto Atreides II, God Emperor God Emperor of Dune