Brainmakers How Scientists Moving Beyond Computers Create Rival To Humn Brain

A fascinating tour behind the scenes at laboratories around the world as top researchers race to create revolutionary "thinking machines" that may one day lead to a new form of intelligence. Join David Freedman as he takes you on a fascinating tour behind the scenes at laboratories around the world as top researchers race to create revolutionary "thinking machines" that may one day lead to a new form of intelligence. The subject of fantasy and skepticism for centuries—from William James's mechanical bride to 2001's Hal to Star Wars' R2D2—artificial intelligence has been limited to number-crunching computers that are "smart" only in highly specific domains like chess—until now. Brainmakers is an eye-opening, mind-expanding, and mind-blowing journey through laboratories engaged in cutting-edge research into neuroscience and robotics. Inside, you'll discover: MIT's Attila, a 3.6-pound, six-legged robot that learns as it interacts with its surroundings. Japan's efforts to grow brain cells on chips and construct a "wiring diagram" of the human brain. UCLA's "robot farm," where robots will be "bred" for intelligence. In exciting yet accessible detail, Freedman shows how this research has moved into a new realm that transcends computer science, combining neuroscience, microbiology, evolutionary biology, and zoology. Modeled after natural rather than artificial intelligence, thinking machines may soon develop powers that rival—or exceed—those of the human brain.

This authoritative reference work will provide readers with a complete overview of artificial intelligence (AI), including its historic development and current status, existing and projected AI applications, and present and potential future impact on the United States and the world. Some people believe that artificial intelligence (AI) will revolutionize modern life in ways that improve human existence. Others say that the promise of AI is overblown. Still others contend that AI applications could pose a grave threat to the economic security of millions of people by taking their jobs and otherwise rendering them "obsolete"-or, even worse, that AI could actually spell the end of the human race. This volume will help users understand the reasons AI development has both spirited defenders and alarmed critics; explain theories and innovations like Moore's Law, mindcloning, and Technological Singularity that drive AI research and debate; and give readers the information they need to make their own informed judgment about the promise and peril of this technology. All of this coverage is presented using language and terminology accessible to a lay audience.

This book is divided into three parts. The first part, ?Mathematical Tools and New Developments?, provides basic tools to treat fuzzy set theory, rough set theory, fuzzy control, fuzzy modelling, decision support systems, and related applications. The second part, ?Intelligent Engineering Applications?, reports on engineering problems such as man-machine interface, risk analysis, image processing, robotics, knowledge-based engineering, expert systems, process control integration, diagnosis, measurements and interpretation by intelligent techniques and soft computing used for general engineering applications. The third part, ?Nuclear Engineering Applications?, concentrates on nuclear applications and covers several topics such as nuclear energy, nuclear safety assessment, radioactive waste management, nuclear measurements, nuclear safeguards, nuclear reactor operation, reactor controller design, fuel reload pattern design, signal validation, nuclear power plants, and optimizations in nuclear applications.

The inventor of the most innovative and compelling technology of our era, an international authority on artificial intelligence, and bestselling author of The Singularity is Nearer now offers a framework for envisioning the twenty-first century in The Age of Spiritual Machines--an age in which the marriage of human sensitivity and artificial intelligence fundamentally alters and improves the way we live. Kurzweil's prophetic blueprint for the future takes us through the advances that inexorably result in computers exceeding the memory capacity and computational ability of the human brain by the year 2020 (with human-level capabilities not far behind); in relationships with automated personalities who will be our teachers, companions, and lovers; and in information fed straight into our brains along direct neural pathways. Optimistic and challenging, thought-provoking and engaging, The Age of Spiritual Machines is the ultimate guide on our road into the next century.

An introduction to the work and ideas of artists who use—and even influence—science and technology. A new breed of contemporary artist engages science and technology—not just to adopt the vocabulary and gizmos, but to explore and comment on the content, agendas, and possibilities. Indeed, proposes Stephen Wilson, the role of the artist is not only to interpret and to spread scientific knowledge, but to be an active partner in determining the direction of research. Years ago, C. P. Snow wrote about the "two cultures" of science and the humanities; these developments may finally help to change the outlook of those who view science and technology as separate from the general culture. In this rich compendium, Wilson offers the first comprehensive survey of international artists who incorporate concepts and research from mathematics, the physical sciences, biology, kinetics, telecommunications, and experimental digital systems such as artificial intelligence and ubiquitous computing. In addition to visual documentation and statements by the artists, Wilson examines relevant art-theoretical writings and explores emerging scientific and technological research likely to be culturally significant in the future. He also provides lists of resources including organizations, publications, conferences, museums, research centers, and Web sites.

MEMS technology and applications have grown at a tremendous pace, while structural dimensions have grown smaller and smaller, reaching down even to the molecular level. With this movement have come new types of applications and rapid advances in the technologies and techniques needed to fabricate the increasingly miniature devices that are literally changing our world. A bestseller in its first edition, Fundamentals of Microfabrication, Second Edition reflects the many developments in methods, materials, and applications that have emerged recently. Renowned author Marc Madou has added exercise sets to each chapter, thus answering the need for a textbook in this field. Fundamentals of Microfabrication, Second Edition offers unique, in-depth coverage of the science of miniaturization, its methods, and materials. From the fundamentals of lithography through bonding and packaging to quantum structures and molecular engineering, it provides the background, tools, and directions you need to confidently choose fabrication methods and materials for a particular miniaturization problem. New in the Second Edition Revised chapters that reflect the many recent advances in the field Updated and enhanced discussions of topics including DNA arrays, microfluidics, micromolding techniques, and nanotechnology In-depth coverage of bio-MEMs, RF-MEMs, high-temperature, and optical MEMs. Many more links to the Web Problem sets in each chapter

Stock Analysis in the Twenty-First Century and Beyond For years, financial analysts have struggled with the fact that practically all the financial measures used to analyze corporate performance lack predictive power when it comes to forecasting the market performance of the company’s stock. Numerous academic studies have documented and reported this lack of predictability. Correlation coefficients close to zero have been reported for the relationship between stock market performance and such critical financial measures as earnings growth, sales growth, price/earnings ratio, return on equity, intrinsic value (models based on discounted cash flow or dividends), and many more. It is this disconnect between traditional financial measures and the performance of stocks in the marketplace that has led to the now-famous efficient market hypothesis, the cornerstone of modern portfolio theory. To accept the idea that the future performance of stocks is unpredictable is to say that nothing a company does will affect the future performance of its stock in the market, and that is absurd. It would be more accurate to say that everything a company does will affect the future performance of its stock in the market. The problem with this statement is that it makes the forecasting of future stock performance so complex that it removes it from the realm of human solution. Confident in the belief that something other than chance and irrational investors determine future stock prices, several research groups around the world have started exploring the use of intelligent computer programs (programs that self-organize based on environmental feedback). Early results are very promising and have provided a glimpse of the economic forces described by Adam Smith as the invisible hand that guides economic activity. Stock Analysis in the Twenty-First Century and Beyond describes the stock analysis problem and explores one of the more successful efforts to harness the new intelligent computer technology. Many people mistakenly classify Artificially Intelligent (AI) computer systems as a form of quantitative analysis. There are two distinct differences between advanced AI systems and traditional quantitative analysis. They are (1) who makes up the selection rules and weighting and (2) what information is used to discriminate between good- and poor-performing securities. In most quantitative systems, even in an advanced expert system form, humans make up the investment rules and mathematically derive the weightings associated with the rules. Computer systems that depend on outside human intelligence to program their actions are not inherently intelligent. In advanced AI systems, the computer makes up its own rules and weightings. The computer learns from examples of good- and poor-performing stocks and determines its own ways for discriminating between them. The procedures that are derived by the computer are often so complex that they defy human understanding. In addition to making up its own rules, advanced AI systems look at corporate financial data differently. Just like in the human brain, where information is not stored in the brain cells but rather in the connections and relationships between cells, so too is corporate performance information stored in the relationships between financial numbers. Assessing the performance of companies is not so much in the numbers as it is in the connections between the numbers. Financial analysts recognized this early on and have used first-order relational information in the form of financial ratios for many years (price/book, debt/equity, current assets / current liabilities, price/earnings, etc.). Now with advanced AI systems, we are finally able to look at and evaluate high-order interrelationships in financial data that have been far too complex to analyze with less sophisticated systems. These then are the fundamental differences between what has been used in the past and what will be used in the future. Cdr. Thomas E. Berghage

Professor Goldman has contributed articles and books in divers fields of political science. This is a partial collection of his principal published and unpublished journal articles as well as brief references to his principal books. Professor Goldman's years at Michigan State and San Francisco State Universities provided opportunities for instructional experimentation and management of educational programs: at MSU, the American Politics Graduate Training Program; at San Francisco State, experiments in small-group peer-instruction. Other experiments: self-paced instruction; an assessment program for political science majors, and simulations of disarmament conferences. His RolePlay is an innovative teaching program for K-12 social studies.