
Common Sense Comes to Computers - elsewhen
https://www.quantamagazine.org/common-sense-comes-to-computers-20200430/
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Animats
You can try this system at
[https://mosaickg.apps.allenai.org/comet_atomic](https://mosaickg.apps.allenai.org/comet_atomic)

After playing with it for a while, it's clear that it's a natural language
interface to a classic database of common sense info. If there's no exact
match in the database, you get nothing.

There's no inference, just connections. I've been trying variations on
"PersonX gets in car, PersonY gets in car, PersonX drives to mall." to see if
I can get it to deduce that PersonY is at the mall, but it can't take that
leap. I tried "PersonX puts apple in box, PersonX takes apple out of box,
PersonX looks in box.", which is rejected. So it doesn't understand
conservation.

This is way too much like Cyc.

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yvdriess
Whenever this topic comes up, I simply have to point to the paper with the
best title in history: Lieberman's _" How to Wreck a Nice Beach You Sing Calm
Incense"_

[https://agents.media.mit.edu/projects/voice/p4010-lieberman....](https://agents.media.mit.edu/projects/voice/p4010-lieberman.pdf)

~~~
dreamcompiler
In the early days of Cyc, Doug Lenat used to give talks where he would put up
a slide titled "How to Wreck a Nice Beach" and then he'd remain silent for a
few seconds. It was always amusing to watch the audience try to puzzle out the
title, and finally there'd be this wash of amusement on their faces when it
clicked.

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seph-reed
Is there an AI out there that asks questions yet? You know, like a child? It
seems like creating a massive database of all the "common sense" could be done
fairly easily if the AI could just ask for help.

~~~
brundolf
Cyc has taken a few different swings at this kind of thing throughout its
history. Its current long-term plan, not mentioned in the article, is to reach
a "critical mass" of common sense to where it can "question" the open-web and
assimilate new information without help, which is along the same lines.

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zshrdlu
Isn't this what John McCarthy called "non-monotonic reasoning"? I wonder if
they still call it that in the literature. It always seemed to me that
semantic networks would solve this problem. "match", "wood" are not that far
in the network from "fire". Anyway, I'm sure there's a reason this kind of
GOFAI never worked.

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woodandsteel
> Some researchers argue that in order to build real common sense into
> computers, we will need to make use of phenomena outside language itself,
> like visual perceptions or embodied sensations.

As in Merleau-Ponty's lived experience, which I understand has been taken up
more recently under the label of embodied cognition.

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villgax
I almost thought Gary Marcus unveiled something he kept babbling about adding
to his robots....sigh

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djokkataja
> Some researchers argue that in order to build real common sense into
> computers, we will need to make use of phenomena outside language itself,
> like visual perceptions or embodied sensations.

ding ding ding

Of course, once we start creating systems that perceive and sense and reason
about their perceiving and sensing _experiences_ , ethics starts to become a
greater concern. An entirely synthetic living creature is still a living
creature.

