THE EVOLUTIONARY PATH TO SENTIENT MACHINES COLUMN A Brief History of Artificial Intelligence Research

A brief history of artificial intelligence research in the area of the evolutionary path to sentient machines column is presented in this article. The idea to evolve rather than design artificial brains has emerged independently several times. Today, this research is generally known as Neuroevolution, and it is a well-established branch of Artificial Life research. The systems of neuromorphic adaptive plastic scalable electronics (SyNAPSE) program to the tune of 42.1 million US dollars from 2008 to 2012 in an effort to engineer the mind by reverse-engineering the brain. The project produced a prototype chip with 256 neuron-like nodes, surrounded by over 262,000 synaptic memory modules. In the Almaden research lab at IBM, a computer running the chip has learned to play the video game Pong. Even more outrageous was the Human Brain Project led by Henry Markram, which had the stated goal of simulating the entire human brain within 10 years. The project is considered by some to be an extraordinary failure.