IOL : Computer boffins pop AIs $60m question

http://www.opencyc.org/cyc/company/news/APArticle060902

Now this is old news but really interesting. I remember reading about this while studying Comp Sci at University. Doug Lenat and his team at Cycorp, Inc have been developing, since 1984, a computer system that actually understands the world. An example from the article “.. if you ask Cyc whether Lassie has a nose, it would reason that Lassie is a collie, collies are dogs, dogs are macroscopic vertebrates and macroscopic vertebrates have noses, so yes.” This thing can even read news articles on the internet, make suppositions and ask questions that help it derive new rules about the world. It is learning! I think this holds real potential for the future possibility of creating a true artificial intelligence, since the one thing lacking from almost every computer on the planet is an understanding of the semantics and knowledge within the data it stores. Read more at Cycorp and OpenCyc.org . We just have to make sure The Singularity does not occur or we might find SkyNet and other sci-fi apocalypses coming true!