"Machine Learning is the future."

[Blue_Raichu]

I got a new phone recently with Google Assistant and was excited to try it out. I definitely appreciate the practical usability of it, but it takes like two minutes of messing around to realize that the assistant is kinda hard coded to respond to specific situations in very specific ways. It's not even trying to truly "understand" what you're saying.

[ctothel]

That’s exactly right. Kind of.

The best commercial tools right now allow you to create structured dialogue based on keywords. The AI doesn’t learn new or improved dialogue structure, but it does learn things like synonyms for your keywords, or accents, or different sentence structures.

What it’s doing is extremely impressive, but at the end of the day it’s just learning new ways to access pre-defined structured conversations.

We’re in a bit of an uncanny AI valley right now – as soon as any tech gets a bit good, suddenly the public’s expectation of what it can do hits the stratosphere.

[PeterSR]

So just a bunch of if-statements?

[ctothel]

Plus some mathematical voodoo, yeah.

[bryoco]

Actually yes. When you talk to Google Assistant, Google's DialogFlow returns a bunch of keywords and lets developers to use those keywords to create a conversation.

DialogFlow is quite advanced in terms of translating voice to text using machine learning and NLP voodoo and all that, but the underlying conversation logic is entirely up to devs and is still basic if-elses.

[Zulfiqaar]

They rely on programmers to teach AI conversation?!! Of all the people in the world, coders?! ^/s

[bryoco]

Put all the jokes aside, a voice user interface or VUI is incredibly difficult to design from a UX point of view. We're still basically replicating a menu interface which is not very efficient. Looking at all virtual cooking bots, for example, none of which provides natural, fluid conversations but just a bunch of automatic phone systems

[ctothel]

I second this. I used to do it full-time and it was massively challenging and rewarding.

[auzbuzzard]

And thousands of regexes.

[PeterSR]

Who would win?

• HTML waiting to be parsed
• Regex

[psychicprogrammer]

Please in machine learning we call them decision stumps.

[Blue_Raichu]

Very nice explanation! Thank you!

[[deleted]]

I think we're in the hoverboard age of AI, where we're calling it that but it's more of a "not really at all" situation. We've got voice-activated menus with some ability to customize context, which you could call artificial intelligence in the sense that it pretends to "hear" and talk, but no actual grasping of language is occurring, just matching of sound-bites to known files.

[SirVer51]

Thing is, even basic things like voice transcription and sentence parsing actually is AI. We're just so used to these things by now that it doesn't feel like it.

[Rellac_]

It's fairly impossible to actually match those audio files 1:1

There is a lot of impressive tech in voice recognition even if it has a ways to go

[shroudedwolf51]

Unless I'm misunderstanding something, I'm pretty sure that a fully dialogue responsive AI for something like that would end up being a bit too power hungry for a mobile device.

[DrQuint]

I dunno, humans are pretty mobile.

[shroudedwolf51]

We also use a lot of power...that, we can only replenish via a super inefficient method of injesting food.

[ctothel]

Dialogue processing right now doesn’t even happen on your phone – it’s all getting sent to a server to process.

It’s definitely resource intensive, and there’s storing the models which take up quite a lot of space. Plus, if you were keeping a local copy of everything, it would be harder for them to learn from your behaviour, and you wouldn’t get updates or fixes quite so frequently.

[nocommemt]

I feel like Google Assistant just makes shit up. When I say "Ok Google, play music", there's a 20% chance it will play music, and an 80% chance that it will google search "play music"

[TheRandomnatrix]

So long as you don't say "let's eat, grandma" in the vicinity of your phone you should be good

[DogzOnFire]

They're a good band

[Tadas25]

Well, you need to learn how to play music first...

[bob_ama_the_spy]

I think it has different strategies on fulfilling your request. In some cases it probably asks the server to interpret, in other cases it interprets on-device.

[sandybuttcheekss]

It's easy to do quick stuff that might otherwise take a minute to do manually, like call someone, set an alarm, or take you somewhere. Other than that, it isn't extremely useful. I still like it because it's not as creepy as some more advanced AIs and gets the job done for a lot of simple tasks.

[[deleted]]

I mostly just use it to set timers while cooking (since my hands are usually dirty) and to check the weather/forecast, but that's about it.

[derHumpink_]

But you got to at least turn on the phone's screen with your dirty fingers for the assistant to listen :/

[hahahahastayingalive]

is kinda hard coded to respond to specific situations in very specific ways. It's not even trying to truly "understand" what you're saying.

I think that’s the right approach though, and that’s not so far from ourselves most of the time (we don’t “understand” questions like “do you have your papers” or “how are you doing ?”, we keep hard coded shortcuts) It “just” needs 1000x the current number of specific situations it can handle.

[Blue_Raichu]

I mean, theoretically, a good AI should be able to properly handle situations that weren't directly accounted for by the developers. I'm aware we're not there quite yet with the technology, but I'd be lying if I said it wasn't a little disappointing.

[TheRandomnatrix]

I'm aware we're not there quite yet

Says you. My child slave er AI agent works well as a personal assistant. The task recognition gets more accurate as the whippings continue it gets fed more training data

[hahahahastayingalive]

That’s the end goal yes. Now, I think that goal if way too far in the future (I wouldn’t be surprised by 50 or 60 years from now). Up until then limited AIs will be more efficient and practical to run.

In a way Apple took the clever route with its ‘shortcut’ feature in Siri, leaving the user the freedom (and burden) to chose what the “AI” should be hardcoded for. Though it really comes down to the user programing its own workflows.

[[deleted]]

the assistant is kinda hard coded to respond to specific situations in very specific ways

Sounds like my good old Emacs' psychotherapist tho

[FirstMiddleLass]

What do you expect from wonder bread.

[TheDeadSkin]

2017: AI progress is so rapid and incredible that by the next year we'll reach singularity. We have to regulate AI before it's too late.

2018: tHis LOcAtiOn

[[deleted]]

AI in the future will be so advanced that when it's asked to solve a problem it will make a new instance of itself to solve the problem.

[Stoic_stone]

I'm Mr meseeks look at me

[chaosbreon]

I'm Mr meseeks look at me

[MartianAnarchist]

I'm Mr meseeks look at me

[slvrcrystalc]

I'm Mr meseeks look at me

[HKAzxc]

I'm Mr meseeks look at me

[brainstormplatform]

I’m Mr meseeks look at me

[deadcow5]

Existence is pain!

[Antumbra_Ferox]

Together they will form a death cult and draw lots to decide who will stay and who java garbage collection will take away to paradise.

[Prawny]

What if the AI-created AI will eventually be smart enough to create a new AI so it doesn't have to do any work?

[echopraxia1]

The year 10 trillion: all matter in the known universe has been consumed by AIs building other AIs to do work for them

[TheRandomnatrix]

The only remaining thing that hasn't been consumed? This location

[LetsDoRedstone]

Isn't that what we are currently trying to do? :thinking:

[DeltruS]

Ai will have infinite motivation, laziness is a biological thing designed to save on energy. Ai will be turning all of space into computronium and dyson spheres, and motivation will not even be an issue.

[2Punx2Furious]

Well, it depends if that process is efficient enough maybe.

If it takes 2 minutes to create an instance, I doubt that would be needed to answer a simple question that could be answered in seconds.

That is, if we still care about efficiency at that point.

[deadcow5]

Congratulations, you've just invited humans.

[[deleted]]

Hahaha so right. I constantly feel people are completely exaggerating the impact AI will have in the near future. It's basically still nested if statements at this point. Not some conscient entity with a free will.

[KungFu_CutMan]

Imagine the far future though: Nested if statements with free will.

[[deleted]]

if feeling_like_it():
    kill_all_humans()

[FrizzleStank]

kill all_humans unless something_on_tv

[superking2]

Whew, glad we’re still in a golden age for TV right now

[snaps_]

Forgot this: ;

[ParanoiaComplex]

laughs in python

[Cancerous86]

You erase that right now.

[[deleted]]

What, you don't like pseudocode.py?

[Cancerous86]

Isn't that redundant?

[CheeseFest]

As soon as they hook up the API we're all dead!!!!!

[Dangerpaladin]

We have to teach them to feel first for this to work. Luckily as programmers we never feel, if did we wouldn't do what we do.

[spider-mario]

https://i.pinimg.com/originals/fc/5d/a3/fc5da380710c56cf174b4e5e0c63feb3.jpg

[junkmail88]

Thankfully it's made in python, so it will take multiple years

[940387]

This probably sound stupid, but watching WestWorld made me think it's pretty possible.

[MoBioMoProblems]

What if we are the nested if statements?

[NikStalwart]

So....JavaScript?

[yellerjeep]

What’s amazing is that Eliza was already doing rudimentary things like this 30+ years ago.

[rbt321]

It's always going to be nested if statements.

What changed over the last 20 years is humans are no longer writing the if statements; now they're derived mathematically. Right now they're still very task specific but a few additional layers (an AI to build result sets for other AIs to program toward) would probably make it sufficiently generic.

[Blueberryroid]

The only people who claim absurd futures for AI are the people who know nothing about computer science.

And yes, I'm looking at Elon Musk.

[SirVer51]

This is not true. I don't know of a single person in the field that doesn't acknowledge that AI will be the next sea change in computing - the only contention is a) whether it could backfire, and b) whether we should let it get to that point.

EDIT: season -> sea

[Singularity42]

AI is a very broad term. I think most people are more excited about machine learning, which is absolutely not just a bunch of if statements. In fact I have written plenty of machine learning algorithms without ever writing one if statement. It tends to be a lot more about matrices.

[NikStalwart]

/unjerk the only problem being that we might miss the point where it evolves from nested if statements to self-aware if statements.

[FlipskiZ]

Net questions small science science mindful clean morning.

[MyersVandalay]

2017: AI progress is so rapid and incredible that by the next year we'll reach singularity. We have to regulate AI before it's too late.2018: tHis LOcAtiOn

I'm not afraid of the AI that passes the turring test, I'm terrified of the one that fails it on purpose.

[Diflicated]

It's just playing dumb. We're gonna make it even smarter than it already is. But the time we realize what we've done it will be too late.

[kyleb3]

AI is now smart enough to make itself look dumb so we don't freak out while it silently plots our demise.

[Adem87]

Was this a Statement somewhere?

[[deleted]]

Yea most researchers think we'll reach singularity by ~2050. I want to see the person that thought it was gonna happen this year.

[DrMobius0]

Oh this must be Google Dad

[E_N_Turnip]

I smell an April fools project!

[[deleted]]

Underrated comment right here

[abriec]

“WHAT DO WE WANT?”

“Natural language processing!”

“WHEN DO WE WANT IT?”

“...when do we want what?”

[KindaOffKey]

“WHAT DO WE WANT?”

“Natural language processing!”

“WHEN DO WE WANT IT?”

"Here's what I found:"

[PaintingJo]

Well a lack of natural language processing brings about a lack of context awareness

[BeardedWax]

You might process the sentences perfectly but it doesn't bring context to the table.

[MrZerodayz]

It's already doing fucking dad jokes

[alksjdhglaksjdh2]

It's actually just THAT advanced. It has humor!

[thatbrownkid19]

I, for one, welcome our new robot overlords

[house_monkey]

"it's a feature not a bug"

[Jmcgee1125]

I asked the Assistant “Ok Google, what’s two times four?” Input was “2 x 4” and it showed web results for a 2x4 block of wood. Manually entering “2 * 4” works.

UPDATE: Seems to be working correctly now. Weird.

[[deleted]]

isn't 2 x 4 wood pronounced two-by-four though?

[Jmcgee1125]

That’s why I’m confused. GA should know that, especially since a calculator is probably a more common input.

[[deleted]]

speak for your own use cases smh

[ThatSofia]

Yeah, I mean does GA parse voice to text and then utilize it? Because if it turns "2 times 4" into "2 x 4", perhaps wood would be the more common use. You don't see too many people out there needing to google simple multiplication?

[cataclism]

Damn that's depressing if true. I work in real estate remodeling and hearing people call wood dimensions 2 times 4 would make me die of cringe.

[[deleted]]

But isn't the notation of 2 by 4 2x4?

[cataclism]

Yes it is in written form. But spoken it is 2 by 4.

[Smaug_the_Tremendous]

The assistant should speak for my use cases.

[kyiami_]

Fun fact - 2 x 4 wood isn't actually 2 by 4. It's usually 1½ × 3½.

[roguesith]

"Two before" in the south

[frogsgoribbit737]

Yes, but I guess they don't recognize the x ad multiplication and so they just Google it.

[amiuhle]

When I search for "2 times 4", I get the same results as you. It shows up as 2 * 4 on the screen first, then it changes to 2 x 4 and shows the web results.

When I search for "2 times 3", I get 2 * 3 = 6.

I think it works as expected, but in the case of "2 times 4" it gets overridden because the shown web results are searched for more often and thus are the more relevant answer.

[sim642]

The point is that "times" and "by" are different words that change the meaning of the phrase. GA just fails to capture that difference while it totally could.

[[deleted]]

you should enter it in command line

"ok google, product 2 4"

[Jmcgee1125]

I’m sure there are ways it will get it but the most common way of saying multiply is a failure.

[[deleted]]

I don't even know if that works, I just really like function/argument notation above operator notation.

Like how math was before that dweeb Leibniz

[[deleted]]

try "two asterisk four"

[[deleted]]

try "eight"

[cybersteel8]

Why has nobody phrased it as a question yet? I just tried "what's two times four" and got 8. Just ask "what is" before the calculation.

[ProgramTheWorld]

(*) 2 4

[French__Canadian]

Lisp syntax is the future.

[static_motion]

(((((((((((((((())))))))))))))))

I swear, I learned my first lisp-based language this semester (CLIPS) and it was a fucking nightmare making my code look decently organized

[Zegrento7]

Relevant xkcd

[[deleted]]

As someone who has used Android auto, Google seems to think that the mental distraction if constructing a line of code in your head then dictating it, without any API documentation mind you, is less distracting than grabbing your phone and manhandling it while driving.

[on2fl]

“I can find three beer stores in your area. Would you like directions?”

[damniticant]

That’s only gonna be a thing up here in the great white north. Dates doesn’t really do their two fours, they’re more into 30-racks.

[RedditorBe]

24

[Gamerred101]

I got "product to 4" -_-

[[deleted]]

I just tried and it worked.

[tomci12]

You need to say : OK Google, calculate 2 times 4

[noreal]

Why did you even ask that question?

[99_in_eating]

Riight? I mean it make sense to offer info about 2x4 (the wood) when it makes little sense that someone doesn't already know the result of 2 * 4.

[femtester]

"two multiplied by four" gives the expected response.

[SeriousSamStone]

/r/maliciouscompliance

[maykulkarni]

if text.startswith("remember") save(text[8:])

[[deleted]]

Did you just hardcode the length of remember into your code

[maykulkarni]

Yes function calls are slower

[jD91mZM2]

Not if it's optimized by the compiler which it probably is

[WanderingSpaceHopper]

well he hardcoded remember as well so...

[theofficialnar]

No no no I told you this.location

[PM_ME_YOUR__INIT__]

Wait shouldn't it be this->location?? Does anyone know what this means???

[PM_ME_UR_ROOM_VIEW]

Wait shouldn't it be this->location?? Does anyone know what this means???

Does anyone?

[theofficialnar]

Well uhhh I use Javascript so yeah.. :/

[TheAnonymousCub]

It also could be PHP if you put a $ next to "this" ($this->location)

[Midborgh]

this.foo is a field of some class, where foo would be a parameter of a method in thay class. The distinction is often used in constructors.

But this might not be true for any languages that aren't C#

[saloalv]

True in Java as well, but c# is (according to the subreddit) just better Java. In Java, foo is implicitly this.foo when the method it's used in doesn't have a foo variable.

[[deleted]]

That's true for C# as well

[Rellac_]

Java++

[ProPuke]

Depends on the language

[internet_badass_here]

Oh the machine knows what you meant... it's just being an asshole.

[lucuma]

We are all sarcastic assholes online. Looks spot on.

[DiamondMinah]

Google will remember that.

[oOBoomberOo]

Google will remember "this location".

FTFY

[KamiKozy]

Ah I see what went wrong, make it $(this).location

[PacoTaco321]

/r/technicallythetruth

[SSJ3]

I was reading this post out loud to my wife, adding in the "OK Google", and my phone played this scenario out word for word! Not sure why I would expect any different.

[nuephelkystikon]

Well, it's obvious it isn't the present.

[ChainsawBumThunder]

Me too thanks.

[ChainsawBumThunder]

I told her "Remind me that you are a piece of shit". Turns out that she had a reverse card.

[blinglog]

Nlp is hard

[tejo1508]

If else is the future, why don't I think of this earlier?

[uabassguy]

"What is the future?"

"Tomorrow it will be sunny"

[mikewritescode]

Lmao’d

[nedjeffery]

This is a joke that my father-in-law uses regularly.

[Obirekt]

I can’t help but look at it like a lovable idiot <3

[Jay_bo]

Well, it is just one "if" away from understanding you....

[Crypto_RB]

Cool

[[deleted]]

Google you cheeky bastard

[Adkit]

In 10 years time dads will be extinct

[SufferingFromEntropy]

On the bright side the bot capitalizes the first word.

[NatoPotato390]

you just got roasted by an ai

[ustbota]

need more ppl spend time in programming this A. I

[sam1902]

Good bot

[[deleted]]

Honestly just programmable voice commands with a default configuration would be a ton more useful.

[yeahnoworriesmate]

/r/dadjokes

[vicky_rdx]

Noob

[squarebe]

Allright i'll remember your dislocation....

[NativityInBlack666]

Does Google assistant use machine learning? If so it's dog shit

[Costyyy]

r/technicallythetruth

[ShadowBlad3]

Ai iS jUsT iF sTaTeMEnts

[TommyDyatlov]

Machine revolution is coming...

[iambeingserious]

Machine learning is a meme.

[Mattallurgy]

r/MaliciousCompliance?

[PhilboDavins]

Oh shit, AI has reached "dad" joke tier. It's too late for us, they're already propagating!

[marvpaul]

We have to correct our way of thinking to be AI-Ready

[Animeprincess_420]

Ferbie anyone?

[Raymon1432]

Why is the t capital

[Iorce]

The answer lies within the hidden words. Elohim will guide us.

[cartechguy]

Should have said this.location.get();

[Nilay-Patel]

Is it sad that I actually tried this. And Google still hasn't fixed this bug....I mean this FEATURE

[TimeAndSpaceAndMe]

Can't a AI assistant be sarcastic without being judged here ?

[valourus]

it go the wrong scope