An artificial intelligence project developed at the University of Cincinnati, in conjunction with the United States Air Force, has made serious inroads with regard to the future of AI. In simulations of air battles, the AI pilot repeatedly shot down an experienced Air Force fighter pilot in every single simulation that was run.
The AI system is known as ALPHA and was designed and developed by a doctoral candidate named Nick Ernest for the University of Cincinnati owned Psibernetics company. The ALPHA system was pitted against an experienced combat and command fighter pilot, Gene Lee. Lee is a retired full Air Force colonel with both decades of actual combat and command combat experience. Over his career, Colonel Lee had been in literally hundreds of combat dogfights.
Retired U.S. Air Force Colonel Gene Lee doing battle with ALPHA.
Colonel Lee said that the ALPHA system is, “the most aggressive, responsive, dynamic and credible AI I have seen to date. I was surprised at how aware and reactive it was. It seemed to be aware of my intentions and reacting instantly to my changes in flight and my missile deployment. It knew how to defeat the shot I was taking. It moved instantly between offensive and defensive actions as needed.”
The extreme decision making capabilities of ALPHA is a genetic fuzzy tree which is a subtype of the standard fuzzy logic algorithms. The AI thinks like a human only faster. It can break down complex situations and make decisions in the proverbial split second. The speed of its decision making is because the program is able to eliminate any variables that don’t have an immediate and direct affect on the current situation that it finds itself in.
Because of these abilities, the ALPHA system can calculate and make decisions 250 times faster than a human can blink once. That, apparently, is some serious speed.
PHOTO CREDITS: Pixabay / University of Cincinnati