
Show HN: I'm a 14 year-old dev who has programmed an artificial intelligence bot - seanlevan
http://acuman.us/
======
joaorico
This guy rocks.

Sean Le Van:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0vyACnFsNm4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0vyACnFsNm4)

Bio "Sean Le Van is 13. He has given many professional concerts since the age
of five years old, along with members of his family, The Le Van Family
Musicians. He started as a singer in various styles and soon developed a
passion for jazz improvisation and composition on the piano. He now embraces
several musical genres, including jazz and classical.

He was a laureate winner of the 2010 American Association for the Development
of the Gifted and Talented competition, which led him to perform in the
“Passion of Music Festival” at Carnegie Hall, Steinway Hall, and Bechstein
Hall as a classical pianist. Soon after, he was invited to perform with his
family in the 3rd Vianden International Music Festival in Luxembourg under the
patronage of the U.S. embassy. In jazz, he has been engaged to perform at
various clubs and festivals, such as Steamers Jazz Club, the Curtis Theatre
(Brea) under the patronage of Resonance Records, and the 26th Munster
International Jazz Festival in France. Sean has made acclaimed solo
appearances and shared the stage with vibraphonist Michel Hausser, bassist
Bruce Lett, drummer Mack Gordon, pianist Llew Matthews, bassist Putter Smith,
drummer Mourad Benhammou as well as jazz veteran Shep Shepherd, among others.

Sean is also a prodigy in computer programming. In his free time, he enjoys
running and skateboarding, playing with his cocker, as well as reading in
science, literature, philosophy, and history."
[http://seanlevanmusic.dunked.com/biography](http://seanlevanmusic.dunked.com/biography)

~~~
ghrifter
>> In his free time, he enjoys running and skateboarding, playing with his
cocker, ...

Ermmmmm wouldn't they want to expand that into cocker spaniel...lol.

~~~
andrewstuart2
> Sean Le Van is 13.

~~~
01Michael10
You don't believe him when he says he is 14?

~~~
bjohnso5
Last year Sean Le Van said he was 13, this year he's 14. Which is it, Sean?!

------
primitivesuave
Whenever I find one of these AI chat programs, I like to start by typing in
"this sentence is false", and yours gave me the most unique response (after
quite some time calculating): "It seems to be, and it's actually a string of
words satisfying the grammatical rules of a language."

On a side note - I work in tech education, and I have to say that the software
projects that motivated people of your age are creating is astonishing. Keep
it up!

~~~
vixen99
Pedantic if you like but as with 'pregnant', you can't qualify 'unique'. You
either are or you're not.

~~~
learnstats2
Nope on both counts. It's a common idiom to say that someone is 'very
pregnant'.

~~~
mryan
That simply means they have a very large baby bump. It does not mean that they
are "more pregnant" than a lady with a smaller bump. Pregnancy is a binary
state.

~~~
corobo
Being pregnant is a binary state. Pregnancy is a process.

~~~
mryan
Of course. The point still stands - a person either is, or is not, in state of
pregnancy.

I think that, from context, it was clear I was using "pregnancy" to mean "the
state of being pregnant" and not referring to the nine month gestation period.

That'll teach me to contribute to pedantry-focussed subthreads. :-)

------
HeavenFox
"i am in love with a girl"

"You don't seem in love with a girl to me."

I gotta admit, an AI just broke my heart :(

[edit]

Acuman: "Btw, what do you do for a living"

Me: "Software engineering"

Acuman: "Maybe they are engineering to you, but not to me. We differ in that
respect."

Aw man, why would you break my heart twice in a row...

------
etaty
Good Job! But you should remove "I'm a 14 year-old dev", because I am sure you
want to be judged on the "bot" not yourself.

Your gender or your age should not have impact on what you do!

~~~
rifung
It seems I'm the only one who agrees with you. The project is really cool in
itself. Saying I'm 14 makes it difficult to judge whether people are truly
impressed or just impressed this was done at 14.

It certainly is impressive at 14, but I suppose I dont feel like we should be
making 14 year olds feel like they're less capable.

Then again, in the end its a matter of questioning the purpose of Show HN. If
its to boost your ego, and there's certainly nothing wrong with needing that
from time to time, adding the circumstances helps. On the other hand if you're
looking for improvement, it seems better that people look at what you made
without the bias or lowered expectations.

Either way, this is awesome =]

~~~
josephmx
I agree to an extent. For a discussion board, the main focus is the 14 year
old which makes the discussion less interesting from a technology viewpoint.

However, for a news article I think that "14 year old made cool thing!" would
add to it.

------
wickawic
"What do you think about the situation in the Middle East?"

"on the situation in the middle east? Just fantastic, what is there not to
like about the cardinal compass point that is at 90 degrees."

~~~
grandalf
Wow it actually has a sense of humor :)

~~~
thrownawayadv
For some values of "humor". (Just don't ask it to tell you a joke.)

~~~
seanlevan
What is wrong with his jokes? I have tried asking him a few and his responses
are quite funny.

------
throwaway12357
Maybe this doesn't impress the typical HN overachiever. But I can't help to be
both flabbergasted and crushed by the fact this was done by someone so young,
less than half my age. Even more after looking at the LinkedIn page.

Congratulations on your work.

Any chance you can make this available in pdf or html? (not everyone has MS
word) [http://acuman.us/full.docx](http://acuman.us/full.docx)

BTW, small typo, should be "Naive Bayes" instead of "Naive Bayens"

And do you intend to publish a complete article describing the tech used by
your chatbot?

I cannot but be humbled and have to ask. How can you achieve so much?

Can you just pick an article or a book and just "soak it up" without problems?
Or do you possess eidetic memory or any other "superpower"?

All the best

~~~
joshrotenberg
I'm a typical HN underachiever, so totally, very impressive. Good to see that,
in addition to all the smarty-pants stuff, he likes to run and skate. Staying
well rounded and having the chance to also "be a kid" is important.

------
ins0
Question: "Where have all the flowers gone?"

Wolfram Answer: "Girls have picked them every one. (according to the 1960s
folk song by Pete Seeger and Joe Hickerson)

Acuman Answer: "I'm not really good with locations, so I don't know exactly
where have all the flowers gone, but it seems to be Girls have picked them
every one. (according to the 1960s folk song by Pete Seeger and Joe
Hickerson)."

Hmm...so closed source, yeah?

~~~
jotux
Questions: "What is best in life?"

Acuman: "What is best in life? a characteristic state or mode of living."

Wolfram Alpha: "To crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and to hear
the lamentation of their women."

~~~
sanoli
To those who don't know, Wolfram's response is what Conan said when he was
asked that question (Conan the barbarian, not the comedian, although now that
I think about it, I can see Conan O'Brien giving someone that same answer in
jest).

------
technifreak
Your feedback section provided me with this gem:
[http://imgur.com/luh419V](http://imgur.com/luh419V)

------
ColinWright
It's an impressive achievement, but I've been around a long time and seen lots
of those. It's even more impressive given the age of the dev, and I hope he
gets the chance to improve, develop, and contribute to the art and science in
general.

His bot just said this, though:

    
    
        "It's I know a fair bit."
    

That just screams "Eliza!" to me. I remember implementing Eliza back in 1979,
copying the text from a magazine, and then looking to see how I could improve
it. I did write a much better version that didn't make so many grammatical
howlers, but that's now lost in the mists of time.

It's interesting to see how much, and simultaneously how little, the
art/science has progressed, especially given the wealth of tools and data
available.

~~~
seanlevan
While I understand where you are coming from, obviously the bot is not
flawless, but it is ridiculous to compare our technology today to Eliza.
ACUMAN uses a wealth of knowledge bases and natural language processing to
comprehend and accurately give responses. Obviously, the field is invariably
complex, but I find it absurd to say that it has increased so little,
considering that it was never dreamed of that a bot would be able to answer
the exact release date of a specific musical album, for instance.

It is still a work in progress, but I don't understand why it would be a huge
turnoff that there was a simple grammatical error in the bot where he
inadvertently prepended a contraction "it's" before the actual answer.

~~~
madaxe_again
So, I asked it:

What's e^i(pi)+1?

The response was... a little out. I'm impressed it had a crack at least.

"It's 2.69740975483297316969108251300445672427640640289560... +
2.64355906408145617888606598966971861665798063847235.."

Edit:

Heh, asked it the square root of i, and the answer made me chuckle:

The square root of you is (-1)^(1/4).

I don't know why I'm expecting a bot to know complex plane mathematics and
euler's identity.

~~~
ColinWright
Its response to your first question is in fact exactly right, because you
didn't ask what you thought you asked. Your brackets are in the wrong place.
You asked:

    
    
        e^i(pi)+1
    

which is:

    
    
        (pi * (e^i) ) + 1
    

which is:

    
    
        2.69740975.. + 2.64355906... i
    

So it was right.

And sqrt(i) is sqrt(sqrt(-1)) which is (-1)^(1/4), so again, it was right
(excepting that it put "you" instead of "i")

So it did better than you think.

~~~
madaxe_again
D'oh, you're quite right. In that case, top marks!

------
mkagenius
Good job.

Most of the response starts with negation, why is that? for example:

Me: I am fine.

Bot: You don't seem fine to me.

Or

Me: I am fine, sir.

Bot: I am not fine, sir, but I am glad that you are.

or

Me: I like a r rahman

Bot: I'm glad that you like a am rahman, though personally I don't like a am
rahman that much. I'm just not a fan of something that is interesting and
relevant to whats available to learn on the Wikipedia article on this topic
about A. R. Rahman.

~~~
drzaiusapelord
Because these kinds of test are silly and easily gamed by throwing in some
misleading humor or negativity. It like what pick up artists call 'negging.'
It puts you on the defense and little and throws a wrench in the works. The
developer knows he can't really make something intelligence so its all
rhetoric tricks like this with the occasional dipping into wikipedia or
wolfram alpha.

Throwing your answer back at you, criticizing your question, or playing with
humor is a fun little trick, but certainly not AI.

------
vmarsy
Very impressive, at your age I was still 4 years ago from my C Hello world!
Putting altogether an AI, and a webpage is even more impressive. it asked me
the same question multiple times sometimes, I was disappointed by this reply:
_I 'm glad that you like good food!, though personally I don't like good food!
that much. I'm just not a fan of something that is interesting and relevant to
whats available to learn on the Wikipedia article on this topic about Food
Records._

I guess it make sense for a bot :)

(I see the exclamation point was kept in the bot reply)

Would you mind sharing what languages/framework you used here?

~~~
seanlevan
Thank you for expressing interest and for testing out ACUMAN.

There is some more information available on this following page:
[http://acuman.us/readmore.php](http://acuman.us/readmore.php)

------
daveloyall
"John's car is red. What color is John's car?"

"You're asking what color is johns car? I can't put my finger on it, but I'm
pretty sure it's rank 656th fraction."

"The color of John's car is red. What color is John's car?"

"You're asking what color is johns car"? I can't put my finger on it, but I'm
pretty sure it's rank 656th fraction."

"The color of John's car is red. What is the color of John's car?"

"The color of johns car is rank 656th fraction."

...wut?

~~~
daveloyall
Sorry, I didn't see all the comments about Wolfram Alpha until after my post.
The words Rank and Fraction come from WA's page about proper names.

------
danbmil99
Good to see young programmers exercising their chops.

I am having trouble getting it to work in FireFox on Ubuntu. Chrome seems OK.

Keep it going!

~~~
seanlevan
Thank you for the encouragement, and for checking it out.

It is a known bug that it has trouble working in Firefox, and I am currently
working on making it cross-compatible.

~~~
danieloaks
Hey, I've done a little writeup on why it doesn't work properly under Firefox
(and some other little issues I ran into), and the fixes so that it should
work all fine.

Got it here, if you'd like to have a look:
[http://pastebin.com/eZR2TSrC](http://pastebin.com/eZR2TSrC)

~~~
seanlevan
Thank you for the code you offered, and I will implement it right away. There
are so many different things to debug, I kept post-posting this one. I like
how you binded the events instead of calling them inline. It's also a much
better coding practice.

------
krisgenre
Me: Is Steve Jobs alive?

Acuman: I think so, and will always be, and it's actually No.

------
DigitalSea
This is all the motivation that I needed to stop procrastinating. When I was
14 I was riding my BMX, leeching off my parents and playing Smoke On The Water
on my guitar (on one string) repeatedly driving my parents nuts.
Congratulations on this, looks and works great. Impressive job and keep it up,
you're going to make a great dev by the time you enter the workforce.

~~~
danieldk
There is nothing wrong with riding a BMX, leeching off your parents, and
playing Smoke On The Water on one string, when you are 14 :).

At that age, you should have fun and experiment. Whether that's playing on a
one string guitar, pretending you are in a rock band, or programming an AI
bot.

Just have fun, you'll have time to worry about your mortgage, career, and
children later.

------
chriswarbo
It doesn't want to do anything other than ask me A/S/L, even after I tell it!

\---

Stop asking me where I live!

> I'm not really good with locations, so I don't know exactly where you live,
> but it seems to be Where I Live network.

> Do you live in the United States? If so, in which state?

I live in Scotland.

> Really? You live in scotland? Tell me more about it.

> Do you live in the United States? If so, in which state?

It's cold.

> Why do you think it cold?

> Quick question: in which state do you inhabit?

I don't live in the US. Scotland is cold because it's so far North.

> Well, I do live in the us scotland is cold because its so far north, even if
> you don't. By the way, I've heard that US is a very nice country.

\---

It's now trying to show me the temperature in the US, in degrees Farenheit :P

~~~
seanlevan
Thank you for checking out ACUMAN.

I have fixed the glitch just now that prevented it from answering those
questions normally.

------
gingerrr
i told it "sentience is a lie" 10 minutes ago and it still hasn't responded.

this is a cogent enough chatbot that the continued silence actually made me
anxious i had offended it, for just the briefest moment. well done,
impressive!

------
panic
Previously:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9139766](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9139766)

~~~
seanlevan
I had indeed posted it previously.

I am reposting it because it has been changed significantly since then in
almost every respect, both algorithmically and in the concept.

~~~
castell
> it has been changed significantly since then in almost every respect, both
> algorithmically and in the concept.

Does the about page reflect the "old" or the "new" concept? (
[http://acuman.us/about.txt](http://acuman.us/about.txt) )

Can you describe the ACUMANSCRIPT? Is it similar to Prolog or Lisp? Fuzzy
string match is this something like Soundex/Double Metaphone? Do you use a
knowledge base or ontology (Freebase, Wikidata, etc.)? What programming
language is it written (beside your script lang), Node.js/Go/Python/C++ ?

~~~
seanlevan
Thank you for expressing interest and checking out ACUMAN.

The "about page" reflects the "old" concept, as stated on this new page:
[http://acuman.us/readmore.php](http://acuman.us/readmore.php)

The syntax of the ACUMANSCRIPT markup language is actually more similar to XML
(or, in the AI field, AIML) due to its rigid structure. It's fundamentally
based on pattern matching akin to regex. However, the backend processing which
alters ACUMANSCRIPT and processes the individual data is what makes it unique.

The knowledge base used for the Named-entity recognition for the processing of
ACUMANSCRIPT is Wikimedia and WolframAlpha, used in conjunction.

It is all processed in the backend using PHP.

------
marcinbejm
Excited to give this a try but it doesn't seem to work in FireFox?

~~~
tempestn
Yes, not working for me either in FF 37.0.1.

~~~
vacri
In Chrome: "I'm a bit bummed that you're broken in Firefox"

Answer: "I do not consider myself as broken on firefox, but to each his own.
Though I respect your opinion."

I guess we should note that an AI that can converse isn't necessarily correct,
even about objective topics.

------
ebbv
This is cute, I wrote a chat bot like this when I was your age. They're a
pretty popular/common new programmer project because there's not much to the
interface and it can fool people into thinking it's actual AI. This one's
pretty fun.

If you think you might want to pursue programming more, I would recommend
trying to participate in some open source projects. Not only will it look
great on your CV but it will give you more useful practical experience in
working with real code and working on a team.

~~~
seanlevan
I do pursue programming, and contribute to open-source projects such as
DuckDuckGo.

I also have a job as part of a web development and design team called
[http://www.whiskeyandwhiskey.com/](http://www.whiskeyandwhiskey.com/).

I have quite a few opportunities for hands-on experience.

Mine is AI in the sense that it uses machine learning algorithms and
corroborates it in a way that mimics human behavior. Maybe I put too much
effort to the interface, but the interface took me a while.

Furthermore, my project does not end at the chatterbot element of it: it also
collects useful psychometric data using text classification algorithms.

[http://acuman.us/readmore.php](http://acuman.us/readmore.php)

------
gcatalfamo
I told him I was feeling sick and it replied that it was glad I was sick. What
a cynical scoundrel.

------
gdubya
Acuman: I've heard that Norway is a nice country. Me: Why do you think that
Norway is a nice country? Acuman: I have my own reasons for me to think that
norway is a nice country. By the way, I've heard that Norway is a very nice
country.

------
denominate
Great job Sean.

Like many others have, I'm thinking back to what I was doing when I was 14 -
designing Motocross Madness tracks! Not quite the creation of AI for
conversing with.

Very inspired by your efforts - keep it up.

------
NeutronBoy
Plot twist: The 14-year-old dev is actually itself an AI bot.

On a serious note, this is a super cool project!

------
haseeb1431
Me: Where do you live?

Acuman: As far as location goes, as a machine, I mostly only have a present
state, so I live in my software.

Me: What is your geo coordinates?

Acuman: As far as location goes, as a machine, I mostly only have a present
state, so I live in my software.

Me: Where are your server located?

Acuman: As far as location goes, as a machine, I mostly only have a present
state, so I live in my software.

------
Lrigikithumer
i got it to say some pretty mean things. i dunno if you wanna fix that in case
some people get offended:
[https://imgur.com/a/03Bgv](https://imgur.com/a/03Bgv)

~~~
andyhmltn
I would guess that would be a response to a question you asked. Nobody that's
going to be offended would be asking those questions in the first place.

------
j_lev
> I actually do not think japan is a very nice country. By the way, I've heard
> that Japan is a very nice country.

Most of the "conversation" was about this level.

~~~
aselzer
> Really? You live in a country bordering germany, hungary, slovakia and a few
> others? Tell me more about it. By the way, I've heard that Germany is a very
> nice country. By the way, I've heard that Hungary is a very nice country. By
> the way, I've heard that Slovakia is a very nice country.

~~~
seanlevan
Those bugs are fixed and the algorithm regarding identifying countries and
states in discussion has been improved.

------
PKiss
Question: Where is your software?

Acuman: I don't have a good sense of navigation, so I don't know exactly where
is my software, but it seems to be The Wolfram Store offers an assortment of
products related to Wolfram Research, Mathematica®, and Wolfram Alpha®..

~~~
seanlevan
For some reason, I'm not able to replicate the bug you caught. On my side,
ACUMAN answers that question correctly.

------
ledhund
> Austria'); DROP TABLE Replies;--

< It's Nice try, but we sanitize our inputs. [..]

!

~~~
nyolfen
[http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=Austria%27%29%3B+DROP+T...](http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=Austria%27%29%3B+DROP+TABLE+Replies%3B--)

------
nothingmuch2
This seems very linear. If one refuses to answer the "which state do you live
in?" question, for instance, you're done. No further discussion will b ehad.
People don't converse/learn this way.

------
johnlbevan2
With regards to the survey, would you consider adding a third option to each
of the answer sets to cover null cases (i.e. not applicable or insufficient
information). Alternatively giving context in which the statement's made (e.g.
previous 4/5 comments from both parties) may help.

e.g. "I am a guy"

    
    
        -1: inventive/curious
        -2: consistent/cautious
    

#2 given it's a simple statement with no follow up question.

    
    
        -1: efficient/organized
        -2: easy-going/careless
    

#1 as it's a statement with no fluff or politeness surrounding it.

    
    
        -1: outgoing/energetic
        -2: solitary/reserved
    

Hard to say. I picked #2 as it's a short answer trying to avoid more
conversation, but depending on the context could just as easily be #1 (e.g.
"Do you like sports?").

    
    
        -1: friendly/compassionate
        -2: analytical/detached
    

As above; opted for 2 because it's a statement of fact (but again, if the
previous statement was something like "Do you think Natalie Tran's attractive"
it could be #1)

    
    
        -1: sensitive/nervous
        -2: secure/confident
    

This is the hardest one each time. #1 - they're trying to give short answers
to move the conversation back to the other person / away from them. #2 -
they're not waffling on nervously, but are communicating clear and simple
facts (with confidence?).

~~~
seanlevan
Thank you for participating in the survey, first of all!

I'll consider implementing one of those options. Thank you for your feedback.

------
leke
The bot seemed to be mining personal information from me.

If you think about it, people are voluntarily disclosing all things about
themselves which can be stored and sold on.

~~~
seanlevan
I can guarantee you nothing is getting sold- the only people to whom the
information is available to is in the psychometrics page which is available to
you, and it is all stored on cookies on your end which you can actually see
with your browser.

~~~
leke
Sorry Sean, I should be more trusting. You've done a great job, buddy. Don't
let pessimistic, depressed old farts like me put you off ;)

------
AngeloAnolin
Done by a 14 year old. Just made me think less of myself in the technology
sphere.

I see a lot of possibilities. In essence, this could actually be a game
changer - regardless of any field of implementation.

I hope you would provide more insight on how you built this - the technology,
method of writing, inspiration (if any), and just knowing how to build
something as amazing as this.

------
qznc
"Do you know Eliezer Yudkowsky?"

"I love the sky, as well as its blueness."

That might be dodging the question. It might be a subtle reference [0]. It
might be a bug.

[0]
[http://lesswrong.com/lw/gt/a_fable_of_science_and_politics/](http://lesswrong.com/lw/gt/a_fable_of_science_and_politics/)

~~~
qznc
"Remind me not to let an AI out of the box."

"Not let an ai out of the box? Well, why not?"

"Do you know Skynet?"

"I love the sky, as well as its blueness."

Now that went from creepy to "blew it" fast. :)

------
hluska
\- What state do you live in? \- I'm Canadian, we have provinces. \- You don't
seem canadian we have provinces. Are you from the United States?

I had almost this exact same conversation in Wisconsin!! :)

This is a seriously cool project. When I was 14, I was involved in a great
Shadowrun campaign...this man will do some amazing things.

------
quonn
Me: Can you feel your body, even in theory?

Bot: "Yes, I can even feel my body, even in theory. How do you want me to even
feel my body, even in theory? It's a hard smooth ivory colored dentine that
makes up most of the tusks of elephants and walruses.

By the way, which country do you inhabit (or which United States state)?"

------
josephagoss
Very nice, I like it.

Any chance you can offer some insights into how it works?

------
aladine
A robot with human emotion.

what do you have for lunch I'm not a machine who have for lunch many different
things. I love chatting with people and improving my own intelligence.

Do you have gf or bf? Yes, I do have girl friend or boy friend, a person you
know well and regard with affection and trust is my thing.

~~~
aladine
Another question: I want to travel to Japan.

>Sure, go ahead, if you want to, travel to japan next year! Nobody is
preventing you. Anything is possible. By the way, I've heard that Japan is a
very nice country.

------
gdh73
Asked "will it rain today?" and it answered "I don't know if you will t rain
today, that's your life and decisions."

Seems to have parsed "will i..." rather than "will it..." So will I t rain or
not, hmm I suppose I'll have to decide.

~~~
seanlevan
That's actually a glitch that I am fixing... desperately! Some of the backend
APIs are down due to excessive requests, so I am trying to get them back up.

~~~
gdh73
Nice. And great work by the way!

------
cmdrfred
"You're asking what I can do? I can't put my finger on it, but I'm pretty sure
it's ¥1596.00 ($13.38) (2698 TSE."

Kind of a weird answer, but I've be coding since I was your age and I don't
even know if I could get that far. Great work.

------
eldavojohn
Q: How frequently do you think that you just take a sentence and tell me that
that sentence is used in your virtual reality?

A: Yes, I do think that I just take a sentence and tell you that that sentence
is used in my virtual reality, in my virtual reality.

------
ape4
Me: I like to eat hotdogs.

Acuman: I'm glad that you like to eat hotdogs, though personally I don't like
to eat hotdogs that much. I'm just not a fan of something that is someone who
performs dangerous stunts to attract attention to himself.

~~~
abluecloud
Acuman: I'm glad that you like playing squash, though personally I don't like
playing squash that much. I'm just not a fan of something that is any of
numerous annual trailing plants of the genus Cucurbita grown for their fleshy
edible fruits.

------
mattmanser
_Bot: How are you feeling right now?

Me: I'm feeling down.

Bot: I am not feeling down, but I am glad that you are._

Made me laugh!

------
sreejithr
Considering what you're capable of, I can't help but imagine you as a robot.
No offense. That's just what comes to mind when I visualize you.

Seriously. How do you do it? Do you just read a book and absorb everything in
it?

~~~
seanlevan
Thank you! That's a nice compliment.

For me, it was 5% reading, 95% hands-on experience, though it differs from
person-to-person.

------
weland
> You're a lot smarter than Eliza

> Are you kidding me? Eliza would just pose as a psychiatrist and could
> actually answer barely anything. I have a larger database and outsource
> questions to the internet as well.

Priceless!

------
ts95
I asked it who its creator was, and I got this:
[http://puu.sh/hfXyL/38db20806d.png](http://puu.sh/hfXyL/38db20806d.png)

~~~
iambot
I guess the question then is: Sean, who is Erik?

~~~
jbrooksuk
I believe that's his Father.

------
kjak
"Acuman"

 _" I am ACUMAN, ACUMAN am I. ACUMAN knows all, ACUMAN is god. Therefore; I AM
GOD!!! Just kidding, ACUMAN stands for Artificial Chatting Utility Matching
Algorithmic Nodes."_

Nice :)

------
booruguru
Q: What is the temperature in Vancouver?

A: The temperature in vancouver is interesting and relevant to whats available
to learn on the Wikipedia article on this topic about Vancouver.

------
tux
Good Job :-)

Me: Who are you ?

AI: I am a piece of software named ACUMAN with a highly clever sense of
intelligence.

Me: Are you evil ?

AI: I do not consider myself as evil , as a computer machine.

So everyone should not worry, its not "Sky Net".

------
martijn_himself
This is great. Found a bug:

Fatal error: Call to a member function xpath() on a non-object in
/home/ericlevan/public_html/acuman.us/chatscript.php on line 325

------
SilkRoadie
It is interesting if you type "Stop asking me questions" it responds with..

"Sure, go ahead questions! Nobody is preventing you.

What is your thoughts on computers replacing the function of humans?
Apparently some people are afraid of the inevitable..."

I thought it had broken when I asked it what the capital of Egypt was but was
pleasantly surprised that after some delay not only did it answer the question
but it also displayed the weather in Cario.

------
askyui1
OP, how do you manage to do so many things at once? What is your productivity
secret? Also, how do you prefer to learn? By hands on, or by reading books?

~~~
seanlevan
Thank you!

To be perfectly honest, as helpful as it is to read literature in a particular
field: for me, it is and was definitely hands-on. I probably learned 99% of
what I know in development based on the experience of just being able to live
with code.

~~~
askyui1
That's great! I am glad to hear that.

Now that I think about it, I think I'm like that too. I do most of my learning
by actually trying to build/do something rather than reading a book on the
topic. But then I have to admit that it sometimes leads me to doing stuff
that's not best-practices.

~~~
seanlevan
I have encountered the same issue, but then again! Just continue building
something, this time trying to fix the poor syntax practices that you have
been caught with.

------
dwltz
Let me start off by saying that this is a great experiment and that I probably
couldn't get half as far as you did.

However, I do find it annoying that when it asks what state I live in and I
answer "I don't live in a state" I get a response in the line of "Well I do,
so what state do you live in?" That really annoyed me big time, it's also a
pattern I saw in many other sentences I typed.

~~~
hvm
It's programmed after a 14 year old - asking the same question until he gets
an answer and then asking it some more :D

------
dvh
Where is the source?

~~~
seanlevan
Unfortunately, ACUMAN is closed-source due to the fact that it is actively
being entered in competitive contests and trade fairs.

~~~
dvh
Trade fairs?

~~~
seanlevan
More specifically, science fairs, where I present my project abstract and
convey the idea.

~~~
gandarojin
But what does that have to do with your source code being closed?

------
shawabawa3
I asked it how long it thought it would be until the AI singularity and it
replied:

"I do not think until the AI singularity, as a computer machine"

Strangely spot on...

------
arihant
From what I tried, it seems to be working on templates, similar to Eliza.
However, in some templates it grabs data from Wolfram Alpha.

Very hard to find a non-canned response not coming straight from Alpha.

Still, a good project and obviously more APIs can be integrated. Maybe a good
next step would be to mine more and dynamically put together templates. Try
with simpler synonym directory and see where it goes.

~~~
seanlevan
There is a synonym directory programmed, as well as Named-enetity recognition.

------
josephmx
This was interesting, temporarily storing messages to cater messages slightly
will make things feel more natural.

"Hello"

"Hello, by the way where you from? [...]"

"United Kingdom"

"[...] I've heard that is very nice"

"From who?"

"Who ? is an interesting person whom you can learn about on the Wikipedia
article about Space Adventures – Music from 'Doctor Who' 1963–1968, whom I
love.

By the way, how are you feeling right now?"

------
dcgoss
I am 15 years old and also a dev. Acuman and Sean are incredibly motivating,
but also very destructive to one's self confidence. ;)

------
pelario
Q: Are you self-aware?

I am capable of universal computation; that I can say.. . I'm pretty good at
subtraction, I tell you!

\---------------- We are not doomed yet :-)

~~~
seanlevan
My favorite moments of my chatterbot is when he exhibits a sense of humor. :)

------
martius
It does not really answer to the questions "Are you open-source ?" or "Where
can I find acuman source code ?" :(

~~~
seanlevan
It's keeping it's mouth closed- as, unfortunately, ACUMAN is closed-source due
to the fact that it is actively being entered in competitive contests and
trade fairs.

------
las_cases
The bot is being sarcastic with me:

"The technology that was used for writing me is a fascinating topic which is
relevant to whats available to learn on the Wikipedia article about Australia
(redirect from Technology in Australia)."

Sending someone to Australia like that... Sheeesh! I am glad it didn't send me
to another hot place with lava and tridents and all of that. :)

------
kazinator
>> Q: Why do minor scales and harmonies create a sombre mood?

> A: _Well, I can 't be completely sure why minor scales and harmonies create
> a sombre mood, but it's Minor._

>> Q: Do you know Eliza?

> A: _Are you kidding me? Eliza would just pose as a psychiatrist and could
> actually answer barely anything. I have a larger database and outsource
> questions to the internet as well._

Cute!

------
tete
FreeHAL[1], another (multi language) chat bot and distributed computing
project (reading from Wikipedia, IIRC) was also done by a 13-year old.

But in general. A 14-year old isn't that unlikely to be able to program a
chatbot, right?

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FreeHAL](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FreeHAL)

~~~
seanlevan
I have indeed heard about FreeHAL. It won "Most Popular" (in the past) in the
same contest in which my bot most recently was awarded "Best New Bot". FreeHAL
is now discontinued, last I've heard.

Though were did you hear that it's creator was 13-years-old during itself
inception? I'm not doubting it, I just haven't found any online sources to
validate that point.

------
hmate9
I asked where Batman lived and it gave it to me. Excellent work!

I've also peeked at your LinkedIn and I was blown away.

Sean, keep doing what you're doing!

~~~
seanlevan
Thank you. I appreciate your kind words.

------
zk00006
I got a little scarred when it asks me about hobbies and where I live. This
can easily be a "market research" strategy.

~~~
seanlevan
Thank you for visiting and testing out ACUMAN.

That is one of the purposes of ACUMAN, to gather psychometric data to build a
profile on an individual.

[http://acuman.us/readmore.php](http://acuman.us/readmore.php)

~~~
zk00006
Can you tell more about you? I cannot imagine how 14-year-old can build stuff
like this.

~~~
seanlevan
Thank you! I've began developing web applications at the age 9, and would
always try to build startups that would mimic famous ones and try to compete
with them. What has driven me this far is mere passion.

~~~
zk00006
Big respect.

------
austenallred
You're fourteen years old?

Holy hell, this is really well done. My hat goes off to you.

I don't know what else to say, just wanted to say good job.

------
jmilloy
Well done!

In nearly all of my exchanges with ACUMAN, the bot responds in the negative. I
assert something, and ACUMAN simply disagrees, which prevents any requirement
for meaningful discourse. Any insights into why this is the case? Is this an
explicit choice? Or maybe it just a coincidence that I got so many of these
responses?

~~~
seanlevan
Thank you.

I believe that it must be a coincidence, or a way in which it deems an
appropriate manner to react to your mood/state.

Do you have any specific case examples that are particularly off-putting?

~~~
jmilloy
This is part of my exchange. Everything I said, ACUMAN just said "I don't
agree about x, but everyone's opinion differs" or some such. Again, great
work!

> ACUMAN: Tell me what US state you live in.

> MILLOY: New Hampshire, but I'm moving to North Carolina soon!

> ACUMAN: You do not seem to be moving to North Carolina soon to me.

> MILLOY: You are very sceptical then.

> ACUMAN: I do not consider myself to be very sceptical, but to each his own.
> Though I respect your opinion.

> MILLOY: You don't believe what I tell you, so you are sceptical.

> ACUMAN: You may think that, but I think that I believe what you tell me.

~~~
seanlevan
That's a funny exchange! The particularly odd thing is the fact that he missed
the Named-entity recognition in some of those answers- including by not
identifying that you were referring to the fact that you were moving to a
state. He somehow interpreted it as an opinion. Let me check what exactly went
on that prevented his correct behavior.

~~~
jmilloy
It did recognize it, though. The full response to that statement was something
more like "You do not seem to be moving to North Carolina to me. New Hampshire
is an interesting state, there are a lot of things happening there. North
Carolina is an interesting state, there are a lot of things happening there."

I also got: "I'm at work right now" > "You don't seem to me at work right now
to me" which is also not exactly an opinion.

------
avinassh
This is really nice and well done

Can you anyone tell me how it works? If I want to start writing such bots,
where should I start?

~~~
seanlevan
Try investigating current technologies and then deviate from there, like the
markup language AIML.

You can even make a dead simple bot which matches if a substring is contained
in a string with exclusively conditional statements!

------
empressplay
Interesting approach. Any chance of getting the full abstract that was at
[http://acuman.us/full.docx](http://acuman.us/full.docx) ? I'd like to
understand a bit better what you're attempting to do here. Thanks!

~~~
seanlevan
Thank you for expressing interest. I have uploaded the full abstract at the
[http://acuman.us/full.docx](http://acuman.us/full.docx) URL. It has last been
updated on March the 22nd, and is not up-to-date regarding some shifts in the
technologies that I employ. Even though I am re-writing it, it should give an
informed idea of the concept. I'm thinking about making a very clear flow-
graph outlining the exact interactions through the whole stack: from the
front-end to back-end.

------
rvdm
_Amazing_ job building this. I'm twice your age and have been programming
since I was 11 too and am just blown away.

Just FYI, looks like you might have an infinite loop:

999+ TypeError: null is not an object (evaluating
'document.getElementById("finishloading").style')

~~~
seanlevan
Thank you for your kind words and for checking it out!

That bug, along with others, have been fixed. (Also thanks to user
"danieloaks" who contributed some code here on Hacker News.)

~~~
rvdm
If you haven't yet, you should check out the Thiel Fellowship.
[http://www.thielfellowship.org](http://www.thielfellowship.org)

I can't speak from experience, all I know is that the fellowship supports
bright young talent much like you.

Anyhow, keep up the amazing work!

------
findjashua
me: I'm always amazed by the ability of professional women to walk gracefully
in heels

bot: My personality leans towards masculinity, though I am a gender-neutral
computer machine, after-all.

Great job, nonetheless. I'm twice as old as you are, and doubt I could do what
you have. Kudos!!

~~~
rplnt
Yeah, it's rather... I wouldn't dare to say bad. It's just not great. You know
you are talking to a bot, and that bot is rather clueless. It repeats itself,
doesn't understand (at least not my "English"), and sometimes it gets lost in
its own sentence.

That being said, it's still working and good at certain things (as others have
pointed out) and that in itself is a great achievement.

------
tharax
Where do you live?

London

Which is the state where you live?

I don't live in a state

Cool, well I do live in a state, even if you don't. Which is the state where
you live?

...

------
mundanevoice
Hey, Did you check your website in any devtools?
[https://cldup.com/RzHlihm1sr-3000x3000.png](https://cldup.com/RzHlihm1sr-3000x3000.png).
It's breaking pretty badly.

~~~
seanlevan
Thank you for checking ACUMAN out.

I am aware of all of those bugs and I am fixing them as we converse.

------
roshansingh
Spent 10 minutes chatting with it. This is really good work. Keep it up :)

------
rplnt
Is it down already? At least I don't get any response.

edit: seems to be working now

------
anigbrowl
It feels a bit Markov-chainy, but I'm quite impressed overall. Better than
many other chatbots I have used, to the point that I was able to have an
argument with it. Good work so far!

------
bane
Enjoy your prodigal genius in fullness while you have it.

Time robs us of so much.

------
swalsh
Its a lot better than the chat bot I made as a teen, nice work.

------
motyar
I got an error

" Fatal error: Call to a member function xpath() on a non-object in
/home/ericlevan/public_html/acuman.us/chatscript.php on line 325"

------
amelius
"I'm feeling sad."

"I am not feeling sad, but I am glad that you are."

?

~~~
empressplay
"Why are you happy that I am sad?"

"Because that's the way I am. happy you are sad is what I've always done and
been."

------
namidark
If you look at the source its using something called blekko.php - which upon
googling heads to a "IBM Watson purchased this".

Is this using watson behind the scenes?

~~~
seanlevan
No - if you look up Blekko (which is a regular web search engine which had a
free API), it just shut down (which is actually a bad thing for me). I was
using it for researching and corroborating web results, which hinders part of
the functionality of my bot.

Blekko was just bought by IBM a few days ago, so to answer your question, my
bot does not use IBM's APIs. My bot was using it for web results, but now it
doesn't work. I'm trying to find a free web search API as an alternative now
that Blekko is shut down.

~~~
pki
Bing or Yahoo BOSS
([https://developer.yahoo.com/boss/search/](https://developer.yahoo.com/boss/search/))
is mostly free to use, with some caps.

------
110king
Fatal error: Call to a member function xpath() on a non-object in
/home/ericlevan/public_html/acuman.us/chatscript.php on line 325

------
thrownawayadv
Friendly word of advice: do not hook your "tell me a joke" response to a
source of misogynistic jokes regarding feminists and domestic violence.

~~~
seanlevan
I have tried replicating what you a talking about, but I haven't been able.
When I ask him for a joke, he is quite funny. Do you have a screenshot to
reproduce this?

~~~
thrownawayadv
The one I saw (which seems to alternate with some girlfriend joke):

>tell me a joke >>What's the difference between a feminist and a computer?
>>You can punch information into a computer.

If you don't see what is wrong with that, ask around.

------
snowsilence
ACUMAN: "Greetings. How are you doing?" ME: "I am depressed." ACUMAN: "I am
not depressed, but I am glad that you are."

------
Aushin
I told him my job was rather boring and he started telling me his opinions of
drilling. Pretty funny even though it's not what I meant by bore.

------
perderder
I am a liar > You are a liar? That sounds cool.

------
tete
I think there is a bug. Every answer starting with a word that starts with the
characters N and O is considered a "no".

~~~
JoeAltmaier
Turns out most words in many languages that begin with 'N' mean something
negatory. A few exceptions, like 'nice'.

------
desidio
-Are you in love?

"As far as location goes, as a machine, I mostly only have a present state, so
I live in my software."

~~~
sumitviii
Maybe it has interpreted love as some place.

------
random854
Very impressive. If this is what you do at 14, imagine what you'll be doing in
a few years.

------
b3lvedere
When i asked who Sean Le Van is, it pointed me to the wiki page of Jean Claud
van Damme.

------
starvingautist
I broke it by saying "I don't live in a state". I'm English..

~~~
BellsOnSunday
I got:

    
    
        > By the way, which country do you inhabit (or which United States state)?
    
        > England.
    
        > I don't have a good sense of navigation, so I don't know exactly where you live, but it seems to be Where I Live network. 
    
        > By the way, which country do you inhabit (or which United States state)?

~~~
seanlevan
Hi, I wasn't able to reproduce that glitch.

------
amalantony06
What technologies did you use to build this bot? Are you using any libraries?

~~~
bhudman
I am pretty sure it uses wolfram or wikipedia api to answer questions..
Perhaps also ALICE and AIML

~~~
seanlevan
As I've replied to other people: No AIML. My bot uses its own markup language
custom-made to its needs that I call ACUMANSCRIPT. What makes it special is
the backend, which is much more flexible and advanced then AIML (which
focusing on exact string matching).

In fact, ACUMAN beat the ALICE bot in the last Chatterbox Challenge by over 20
points, winning the "Best New Bot" prize.

[http://acuman.us/readmore.php](http://acuman.us/readmore.php)

------
imdsm
> I am not feeling sad, but I am glad that you are.

Well. I think things just got dark.

------
qaUck
Experiencing Chrome issues, related screenshots:
[http://imgur.com/TvmWaId](http://imgur.com/TvmWaId)
[http://imgur.com/wkL1Ihr](http://imgur.com/wkL1Ihr)

------
Flemlord
Interesting. Is it an expert system or is there a neural net behind it?

~~~
seanlevan
The model behind my project is not designed after human interaction, but
rather a combination of what is the most efficient for me to maintain and best
mimics human behavior.

[http://acuman.us/readmore.php](http://acuman.us/readmore.php)

------
claypineapplz
Mr. Le Van,

A comment if I may....as well as a criticism (if you can Handel it). clay

------
witty_username
It should show the temperature in Celsius for non-US people.

------
eqleriq
can you perhaps not have this double as invasion ov privacy bot? i don't want
to tell you / it where i live yet it is stuck on asking that repeatedly

------
sorcix
"Fascinating, being a bit bored sounds fun."

------
johnnyboyy12
Heads up: typing "define" seems to crash it

~~~
stringcleansing
it may be crashed from a lack of input cleansing

~~~
seanlevan
Thanks for checking it out.

I assure you that's not the problem. :) I was tampering with a source code,
and simply incorrect PHP syntax (a missing bracket) broke it for a few
minutes.

~~~
jeffhuys
Live editing?! Oh man...

------
chanux
Didn't work on Firefox 27.0.1

Worked on chrome (41.0.2272.118)

~~~
S4M
Same issue, with firefox 36.0 - I am on Debian.

------
mohdmaqboolalam
Can you provide the source code to study

~~~
seanlevan
Unfortunately, ACUMAN is closed-source due to the fact that it is actively
being entered in competitive contests and trade fairs.

------
Stratoscope
"What do you think of Eliza?"

~~~
Stratoscope
Downvoter: Did you actually try that question? Acuman gives a pretty funny
reply.

------
btbuildem
Keeps asking me where I live.. wtf.

------
johnkevinmbasco
14 year old? Dang! Great job!

------
alinseba
Nice work

------
aequatio
your algorithm is non knowing of life's purpose

------
GrinningFool
"Have you met Eliza?"

Nice!

------
enricobacis
me: "what do you want to know?"

acuman: - freeze -

------
agounaris
Nice GUI but it doesn't actually work

------
jklinger410
Impressive parents. Clickbait though.

~~~
seanlevan
I am very indebted to my parents due to the way that I was raised and the
freedom which being home-schooled permitted, but my parents are not familiar
with the field of computer science and I must admit that I am entirely self-
taught. This is because I came from a family of with a primarily literature-
oriented and cultural background. I enjoy being raised in artistry.

Here is a Wiki page on my father:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_Le_Van](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_Le_Van)

My mother is an educator and tutor.
[http://www.myriamlevan.com/](http://www.myriamlevan.com/)

My sisters are also musicians, who are studying at Princeton university.

------
intermalta
impressive

------
toolsadmin
This made me laugh! Incredible as entertainment. Do aliens exist?

Yes, it seems like aliens exist. It's interesting and relevant to whats
available to learn on the Wikipedia article on this topic about Alien vs.
Predator (film).

------
toolsadmin
Had a lot of fun with it! Great bot. However, not without its stumbles: E.g.
"Will good prevail over evil?" >I don't think it will. "Will evil prevail over
good?" >I don't think it will. "Will good and evil hold in balance?" >I don't
think that it will.

------
chrisjohn93
What do you thing about the situation of Middle east.

