Then the novelty wore off, the fad passed and only a few obsessed owners stuck with their digients, continuing to raise them and care for them even as the platform that they ran on was becoming obsolete.
Antoine de Saint-Exupery, “The Little Prince”Creating virtual pet-like “digital entities” (digients) that are capable of developing intelligence (although initially childlike) and speech by being raised and taken care of in the manner not that different from that of human children - while looking like cute animated characters and, being software, having an option of being suspended when novelty wears off or reset to the previous checkpoint if something unwanted happens - seemed like a marketable idea, and for a while generated profits and buzz. “You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed.” The intersection between the virtual and the real, with the boundaries between the two more porous than it would seem. This is a story of obsession and sacrifice and responsibility - basically parenthood, really. This is a story of artificial intelligence and personhood and what our goals for AI are and can or should be. Not prolific, no - but thought-provoking, certainly. But I’ll take what I can get as Chiang is not a prolific writer either. I can’t help thinking though that the true potential of this story would have been better realized in a longer form, as a novel.
#Story of your life ted chiang epub software#
This is a story of artificial intelligence and personhood and what our goals for AI are and can or shoul Ted Chiang writes in the short form only, with this compact novella The Lifecycle of Software Objects remaining his longest work to date. Ted Chiang writes in the short form only, with this compact novella The Lifecycle of Software Objects remaining his longest work to date. At the same time, it's an examination of the difference between processing power and intelligence, and of what it means to have a real relationship with an artificial entity.more It's a story of two people and the artificial intelligences they helped create, following them for more than a decade as they deal with the upgrades and obsolescence that are inevitable in the world of software. In this new novella, at over 30,000 words, his longest work to date, Ted Chiang offers a detailed imagining of how the second approach might work within the contemporary landscape of startup companies, massively-multiplayer online gaming, and open-source software. The first approach has been tried many times in both science fiction and reality.
Again I do not know what the right answer is, but I think both approaches should be tried." Things would be pointed out and named, etc. This process could follow the normal teaching of a child. It can also be maintained that it is best to provide the machine with the best sense organs that money can buy, and then teach it to understand and speak English. This process could follow the normal What's the best way to create artificial intelligence? In 1950, Alan Turing wrote, "Many people think that a very abstract activity, like the playing of chess, would be best. What's the best way to create artificial intelligence? In 1950, Alan Turing wrote, "Many people think that a very abstract activity, like the playing of chess, would be best.