The gallery.

From: Mike & Donna Deering (
Date: Thu Mar 21 2002 - 08:49:04 MST

When Ben Goertzel mentioned:

>This is where we try to teach the system by interacting with
>it in a shared perceptual environment.

it got my imagination going.

The Gallery.
"This is what we call The Gallery", said Ben. The Gallery was a large room
with numerous computer stations along the walls. Several programmers were
working. "The Nova system can see and hear everything that happens in
here." he continued, "Notice the cameras in the corners, giving Nova true
three dimensional vision."
"Like people, I mean humans?" I said.
"Not exactly. Humans don't have actual three dimensional vision. Each eye
produces a two dimensional picture. The combined stereoscopic vision is 2.5
dimensions at most. Nova has a camera in all four corners of the room
providing true three dimensional vision. We hard coded the visual cortex in
three dimensions by extending the design of the human visual cortex reverse
engineered by other researchers."
"You mean real scientists?"
"Hey! We're real scientists!"
"Sorry. Why even have a Gallery? Why not just hook it up to the internet?
Isn't there enough information there for all the intellectual stimulation it
would need?"
"Well, that depends. If we wanted Nova to grow up to be a web site that
might work. But we want Nova to be a person, so we want it to have
relationships with real people. Take a look over here." Ben crosses the
room and points out a computer station operated by a robotic arm. The arm
is moving the mouse and clicking on links. "This is Nova's web access. We
may eventually give Nova direct access but while she is still an infant we
thought this approach has advantages."
"Can it type?"
"Oh yes, she hasn't shown much selectivity in web pages yet but we are very
"So, bottom line, how long till approximately human level?"
"Barring unforeseen technical problems and continued funding, I would say 18
"Isn't that what you always say?"
Ben frowns.
