Google Deep Mind Defeats World Champion

Yesterday, Google’s Deep Mind Artificial Intelligence machine defeated the world’s top ranked Go player in the second round of a five match showdown. Lee Sedol, who had been predicting he would win 5–0, must win the final three games in order to win the $1 million prize.

Computers have long been able to defeat champions in games such as Chess, Checkers and Jeopardy. This victory acts as another signpost in the journey to an AI-assisted future. Unlike Chess, Go is considered much more difficult for computers to win due to the much larger number of possibilities, making traditional AI methods such as Brute Force more difficult.

Google DeepMind is a British artificial intelligence company founded in 2010 which was acquired by Google in 2014. The company has created a neural network that learns how to play video games in a similar fashion to humans, resulting in a computer that appears to mimic the short-term memory of the human brain. Whilst the neural network’s capabilities are impressive, it is the latest in a recent spate of AI assisted technologies to make waves.

Since winning Wheel of Fortune, IBM’s Watson had evolved into an interesting and powerful query engine. Watson, during medical testing, managed to diagnose patients’ ailments to the same or? higher degree of accuracy than a doctor. While it will be a few years before our GPs are replaced with a HAL-like network of computers, it’s a sure sign of the way the industry is heading. In the present day, the system is used for language translations, emotion detection and investment decision assistance.

Not to be outdone by Big Blue, Microsoft have been busy working on ‘Project Oxford’ for the past few years. Announced in the Summer of 2015, the machine learning system uses complicated algorithms primarily in the analysis of speech and images. Microsoft, to fit in with the recent move into open-source, provides an interface for developers to use. This puts the same systems in our grasp that support the Bing Search engine and Cortana, the Windows virtual assistant.

With these exciting new tools at our disposal, this is an exciting time to be a developer. The facial recognition API of Project Oxford may someday soon allow us to use truly passwordless login systems. The advances of natural speech recognition promises better voice control of our devices and environments. Websites and software will gain a greater ability to adapt themselves to each individual user, tailoring the experience to their specific needs and interesting. Perhaps a holiday booking application can intelligently suggest hotels and attractions in which a user would like to stay, as well as provide all the information needed to make the trip successful.

The biggest hurdle in moving to a more AI centered world is one of culture. The idea of speaking aloud to a device is alien to many, and we certainly feel a little silly when talking to our phones. There is, however, an entire generation who are growing up with an amazing technology potential, and it will be the next crop of twenty somethings who will propel the use of AI based technology forwards.

Regardless of how AI develops to play a greater role in our lives, the signs are that it will be sooner rather than later. We would be interested to hear how important you think AI will be in our ever-connected future. Let us know by connecting on Twitter.

P.S — If you’re interested in catching the remaining matches between Google DeepMind and Lee Sedol, you can watch the remaining four rounds live on YouTube.

Originally published at plymouthsoftware.com.