Ever ask Siri a question and she’s unable to answer it correctly? Ever ask Cortana a question and she’s baffled or confused? Ironically, artificial intelligence isn’t quite smart enough to do everything humans want them to do. But Doug Lenat believes he has the answer to this problem with a thirty year old artificial-intelligence engine he calls Cyc.
With artificial intelligence, there’s a difference between having knowledge and having reasoning. Think of it like the old school comparison of “book knowledge” and “street smarts.” Sure, this probably conjures some kind of 80s-era buddy cop show of a super-smart but whimsical whiz kid and his tough childhood friend with a heart of gold, but it’s why our fears of A.I. taking over the world isn’t possible (yet). A.I. simply isn’t smart enough.
Some software programs may have the collective data of the world at their proverbial digital fingertips, but it doesn’t know what to do with it. It’s why many A.I. are often said to have the mentality of a toddler. Knowing an apple is a fruit and grows from a tree under certain weather conditions during a certain season doesn’t tell you that they’re juicy, delicious and enjoyable. Or that if they fall and hit you on the head, it could hurt. Or encourage you to come up with a new scientific theory. Facts don’t equal common knowledge, because that’s learned.
That’s what Lenat, Cyc and A.I. company Lucid seek to change.
Lenat has been working on Cyc for over thirty years now. Back in 1984, he figured A.I. would need to be taught information bit by bit–figuratively and literally–to be able to both contain knowledge and understand it. After waiting for so long and losing a lot of face with both detractors and supporters, Cyc is out of the gate and ready to do business, as you can see in the video below.
Meet Cyc
While some critics argue that Lenat’s Cyc could never develop into a powerful A.I., it doesn’t seem like that’s even Lenat’s goal in the first place. A.I. generally uses algorithms to sort through data by looking for patterns or keywords, but it takes time to teach A.I. to be “smarter,” and it takes time for humans to look through data and refine their searches more effectively. Lenat believes that Cyc is the answer to that, the human reasoning needed to make A.I. truly as smart as humans. For a closer look at this, take a look at this in the video below:
Introducing Cyc
When you break it down, it sounds like Lenat has developed the closest thing to a digital brain that anyone has made so far, and “raised it” to have thirty years of knowledge. Cyc is basically a mind without a personality: just thirty years of information storage that can connect ideas the way a person can. Connect it to an A.I., and Lenat says it will use those thirty years of reasoning ability to expertly parse through relevant information. Then it can perform tasks efficiently and swiftly and make our lives easier.
According to the above video and Lucid’s Case Studies website, Cyc was put into play with the Cleveland Clinic, which had decades of old records it needed to comb through for clinical trials. Without any kind of standardization that could help match patients based on specific criteria, the process moved at a slow pace. Each case needed an individual touch and couldn’t just be scanned and ran through a program. According to Lucid, Cyc took what would normally cost most A.I. ten weeks to process and did it in ten minutes.
Cyc isn’t perfect, and within the other available case studies there are examples of Cyc needing feedback to improve. But so does all technology, right? Lenat believes A.I. needs hand-coded knowledge to excel and become what we’ve wished A.I. to be: smart, capable programs that can partner with humans and make decision-making even faster.
Will Cyc be the final component that makes A.I. perfect? We’ll find out very soon, as Lucid commercializes Cyc and starts licensing the engine out to various A.I. clients. Let us know what you think about Cyc in the comments below. For more information, check out the Cyc and Lucid A.I. websites below, along with a video that visualizes and demos Cyc’s knowledge base.
Cyc Knowledge Base Visualization Demo
Sources: Cyc, Lucid A.I., via MIT Technology Review