By Guy Harrison
When computers first started to infringe on everyday life, science fiction authors and society in general had high expectations for "intelligent" systems. Isaac Asimov's "I, Robot" series from the 1940s portrayed robots with completely human intelligence and personality, and, in the 1968 movie "2001: A Space Odyssey," the onboard computer HAL (Heuristically programmed ALgorithmic computer) had a sufficiently human personality to suffer a paranoid break and attempt to murder the crew!
While the computer revolution has generally outstripped almost all expectations for the role of computers in society, in the area of artificial intelligence (AI), the predictions have, in fact, outstripped our achievements. Attempts to build truly intelligent systems have been generally disappointing. Full article.