From: Samantha Atkins (samantha@objectent.com)
Date: Thu Mar 11 2004 - 02:02:56 MST
On Mar 6, 2004, at 9:22 AM, Ben Goertzel wrote:
> The major science and technology funding bodies in the US are very
> tightly tied into the "narrow AI" research programme and very skeptical
> of radical approaches to AGI. This is in spite of the fact that
> they've
> spent hundreds of millions of dollars on narrow AI programs (Cyc being
> the flagship example ;-) without obtaining dramatic returns either
> scientifically or economically.
>
> So, if by a "strong case" you mean a case that will convince AGI
> skeptics such as the folks at the National Science Foundation -- I
> guess
> this essentially means "something like young-child-level human
> intelligence has been achieved and what remains is teaching of the
> system and refinement of the algorithms." I have no doubt that once we
> get to this point, ample funding will be available. Also, by this
> point, the political issues associated with AGI will become important
> --
> the Luddites will start paying attention....
>
So why not bypass the "major funding bodies" and the NSF entirely? I
don't see why a strong memetic push could not garner enough angel
investment to fund a $20 million effort, especially spread over a few
years. It is even conceivable that a strong push among thousands of
interested less well-heeled persons could do the trick. This just
isn't that terribly much money for the potentially huge return.
I imagine this has already been tried. What was in the way there?
- samantha
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