When computer scientists programmed the Skytrain which travels across the Vancouver megalopolis, the human train operators were rendered unnecessary. Who paid them? I just audited COMP 2425 at BCIT which is taught all over the world (intro C programming). Currently Dr. Mehta (who has the distinction of being Stephen Hawking's programmer) and I are putting it on teaching machine at
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>. When that is done, thousands of C profs will be rendered as obsolete as the train crews they replaced (BTW, the BCIT prof said Skytrain was originally programmed in C). FWP On Thu, 4 Dec 2003 [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > FWP > > But I am sure we can use the teaching > machine optimally and still retain the option of calling in human teachers > as we (the students) wish. > > arthur > > Who pays the teachers? The idea is to displace humans, especially the high > paid ones. > > > > > -----Original Message----- > From: Franklin Wayne Poley [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] > Sent: Thursday, December 04, 2003 4:53 PM > To: pete > Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED]; > [EMAIL PROTECTED]; > [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED]; > [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED]; > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Subject: RE: [Futurework] Future Teaching > > > On Thu, 4 Dec 2003, pete wrote: > > > On Thu, 4 Dec 2003, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > > > > >Eventually machine intelligence will replace human intelligence > > >throughout the economy. Wonder if the final outcome will be "good" or > > >"bad" Productivity will have increased but human interaction (at least in > > >these traditional areas such as education and probably health care) will > > >have decreased. > > That is a good point. I recently posted a comment to the MIT- list on > the ubiquitous nature of opposing forces like constructive-destructive, > action-reaction, catabolic-anabolic and educational-countereducational. > A variety of motives lie behind educationally progressive and > educationally regressive outcomes. But I am sure we can use the teaching > machine optimally and still retain the option of calling in human teachers > as we (the students) wish. > > The question re MIT's $100,000,000 OCW is to what extent educational vs. > countereducational forces are being applied. Facetiously we have to ask > how much of OCW is "boon" and how much is "doggle". Remember our old > friend the "Unabomber"? He was a Phud mathematician. Yet he was targeting > high tech leaders like Professor Gelernter (computing science) at Yale. > > Both progressive and regressive forces are in the midst of the > intelligentsia. IMO, computing science is a particular target for the > vultures. Was it Prometheus who was chained to a rock by the gods for > giving knowledge to mortals, where he had his liver ripped out daily by > vultures? Would a modern charicature of such a vulture look suspiciously > like Bill Gates? After all, why would Bill Gates want to lead in AI > advances? The status quo works very well for him ... and for many other > neo-millionaires and billioanaires in high technology. What then is the > Microsoft agenda in funding the "reinventing of teaching and learning" as > Dean Magnanti at MIT puts it? Could it not be to enhance countereducation > rather than education? The Microsoft Visual Stdio .NET manual which > accompanied this software is an educational abomination. I have told them > I can turn it into a model of educational clarity but they keep ignoring > me. So what are they up to at MIT? > > > >arthur > > > > I guess this is a good place to relate an experience I had today. > > I'm currently at CERN, helping to install some pieces of hardware > > we've cobbled up into the next great accelerator - big science > > at its most impressive. Anyway, we had this huge piece of hardware > > held up on supports in the middle of a large workroom, when a > > couple of girls came in, one with a camera, and one with a laptop > > under her arm. I thought, perhaps the CERN Courier is going to do > > another little article on the progress of our project. But instead, > > these two take out a bunch of little black squares about the size of > > postit notes, and start climbing up and sticking them all over the > > construction. I'm not sure if they were adhesive, or like fridge magnets, > > or both. Each square has a one cm white spot in the centre, but each > > has a differently segmented white circle around the central dot, at > > about 3cm diameter. Then they take out a pair of telescoping > > rods and extend them to about a metre and a half, and clip them > > to our construction, one horizontally, the other vertically. Each > > rod also has one of the black patches with white coding, mounted > > at each end. Then one sets up the laptop, while the other starts > > taking pictures, walking around the device. While the picture taking > > is still proceeding, the one with the laptop says, "Would you like to > > see?" and shows a diagram already appearing on the laptop screen. > > You see, these girls are the survey team, and they are generating > > a full 3D map of the device. The camera has a wireless connection > > to the laptop and is uploading images. The laptop identifies the > > little targets in the photos and does a brutal quantity of computation > > in real time among the photographs to deduce the position of the > > targets based solely on the multiple images and the two reference > > rods. As the surveyor operating the laptop explained to me (she is > > now a CERN employee, but used to work with the company which developed > > the technology) by taking a sufficient number of photographs, with > > a sufficient number of targets (I'm guessing they used a binary > > multiple, 32 or 64) it is not even necessary to have a pre-calibrated > > distortion free lens on the camera. The software can deduce and > > correct for any aberration in the lens as part of the overall > > calculation. The accuracy of the process is somewhat limited by the > > image quality of the digital camera, though it does much better than > > simple resolution of the camera image - for our gadget, about > > 6x6x3 metres, they get down to about 1/2 mm. So much for theodolites, > > and a day's computations, to generate a survey. > > > > Well, that's my whizzbang techno story for today... > > My doctorate is in phil-psych and not computing. I had an AI prof sign my > masters' papers at U of A and I took matrix algebra from him so that I > could apply it to correlation matrices and do factor analysis but I had > little interest in AI at the time because computers in 1968 were very > limited and AI was a distant dream. > > My 1976 text with Al Buss titled "Individual Differences" is in VPL. > Have a look at Chapter 3 on Mental Abilities and take a profile of man > vs. machine on the 19 primary mental abilities in Table 3.3. My present > expectation is that somebody, somewhere can tell us how to make the > machine surpass human performance on each and every factor. That includes > SO (Spatial Orientation) and S (Spatial Relations). > > Mr. V on the IMP list is a computer scientist/engineer who is working on > the problem of machine object recognition. I keep telling him that if he > can come up with a program whereby a robot can do the Peabody Picture > Vocabulary Test with a cluttered background better than a human, I will > raise the robot personally and teach it a variation on English > ("robo-speak") which will make it 100% clear that this machine is smarter > than any human on the planet. > > FWP > > > -Pete > > > > -----Original Message----- > > From: Franklin Wayne Poley [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] > > Sent: Wednesday, December 3, 2003 8:42 PM > > To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > Subject: [Futurework] Future Teaching > > > > > > Have a look at the robotic teacher I'd like to hire from King's > > College, London: > > > > <http://www.geocities.com/machine_psychology/IMP_Cover_Page> > > > > ---------- Forwarded message ---------- > > Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2003 17:35:46 -0800 (PST) > > From: Franklin Wayne Poley <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > > Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > Subject: [IMP] Final Lesson 36 > > > > There are typically 36 hours of class time for a one semester, 3-credit > > course. Lessons 31-35 are more in the nature of an assignment: draft out a > > set of menus and prompts for the SEE-to-C program or even go further and > > turn that into C code if you are so inclined. How much of my notes on > > SEE-to-C I will post eventually on the expert system program for C code > > writing, I do not know. If I am correct about this (and you can find out > > by trying to write SEE-to-C for yourself) then future students can forget > > about texts like Aitken and Jones ("Teach Yourself C in 21 Days") or a > > course like COMP 2425 at BCIT which takes about 144 hours. Gary Livick's > > C-programmed robot, Etcetera, will be able to teach C in one hour. > > > > Final lesson 36 is titled "Godbot" and it is designed to stimulate some > > creative and metaphysical thinking. If anyone has SPECIFIC criticisms I > > will welcome them. I certainly don't want to cap off a course which I have > > spent so much time developing, with any errors. > > > > <http://www.geocities.com/machine_psychology/The_Ghost_In_The_Machine> > > > > FWP > > > > <http://www.geocities.com/machine_psychology/Table_of_Lessons> > > > > _______________________________________________ > Futurework mailing list > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > http://scribe.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework > _______________________________________________ Futurework mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://scribe.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
