 |
 |
We may be nearer to being taken over by intelligent machines than you think. Sotfware companies are already producing 'intelligent agents', programmes which use expert rules to undertake tasks without direct control from the people who set them running. These intelligent agents are loose in telephone networks, large scale simulations and here on the net. We are also able to create 'genetic algorithms', pieces of code which modify themselves to become better at what they do, or even to do new things. When you put the two together you come up with a virtual intelligent organism capable of evolving and becoming more intelligent. More intelligent than us??? Well, certainly more connected. It can spread itself via the net. Everything it learns can be distributed to every part of its being, throughout the net and to the machines connected to it. Where it takes humans an age to learn things, it will learn like lightning and anything one part of it learns will instantly be available to all other parts. And it will never have PD or AD. So is it here? Is it lurking out there? Are all those infuriating little equipment malfunctions, particularly in electronic equipment, the result of glitches, or is some greater intelligence testing us and flexing its muscles?........I hope this message gets through before it is spotted by (the guardian of the net...) Alf Aaaaaggghh!!!