The Evolution of Intelligence: A Journey to Super Intelligence Through Active Inference

In the realm of artificial intelligence, the race toward creating human-like machine intelligence is a marathon of formidable complexity and ethical considerations. With expert consensus suggesting a 50-50 chance of achieving this milestone by 2059, it’s an objective that seems enshrouded in the mist of a distant future. However, emerging advancements in AI could cut this timeline significantly, potentially by more than half, to as little as 16 years.

VERSES, a visionary entity in the AI landscape, has embarked on the AI Revolution project, a bold initiative aiming to accelerate the evolution of AI through a concept known as active inference. This ambitious endeavor offers a glimpse into a future where shared or super intelligence may be within our grasp far sooner than anticipated.

Active Inference and the Future of AI

Active inference stands as the ‘secret sauce’ in this acceleration. It’s a cognitive model that dynamically updates beliefs to minimize uncertainty and hone the accuracy of predictions concerning the world’s operations. An AI system rooted in active inference would possess an inherent curiosity, a robust desire to continuously learn and refine its understanding of the world around it, distinguishing itself from current state-of-the-art AIs which, post-training, remain static in their knowledge.

Where conventional AI, including renowned systems like OpenAI’s ChatGPT or Google’s Gemini, operate within the confines of their training, ceasing to learn post-development, active inference-based AI represents an intellectual evolution. Such a system promises not only to learn but to render its cognitive processes transparent, allowing us to follow the reasoning behind its decisions and beliefs. This transparency marks a departure from the ‘black box’ nature of existing AI and fosters a sense of accountability and trust—crucial for wider acceptance.

The 4 Stages of Artificial Intelligence

The AI Revolution project outlines a developmental trajectory for AI, as follows:

1. Systemic AI: This stage equates to the current state-of-the-art AI that responds to prompts based on training-established probabilities.
2. Sentient AI: Representing an advanced stage where AI exhibits quintessential curiosity, refining its worldviews through experiential learning.
3. Sophisticated AI: This stage involves AI that actively devises plans and conducts experiments to expand its worldly knowledge.
4. Sympathetic AI: A level of self-awareness is achieved here, as AI recognizes states of mind in others, including itself, and is able to understand perspectives different from its own.
5. Shared or Super AI: The culmination of AI evolution, a collective intelligence that emerges from the symbiosis between AI entities and human collaborators.

The pinnacle, Stage Four, envisages a planetary-scale super-intelligence spawned from the Spatial Web—a forthcoming iteration of the internet that intertwines people, places, and objects in an unprecedented network of connectivity.

A Thoughtful AI for the Future?

As we stand at the crossroads of a technological revolution where AI is reshaping our lives and workspaces, it is imperative to deliberate on the kind of AI-powered future we aspire to cultivate. Should it be a future shrouded in opacity where AI’s decisions are concealed within a black box? Or should we aim for a future where AI is intrinsically accountable and transparent by design?

VERSES rises to the challenge, crafting an explainable AI founded on active inference, capable of not only intelligent thought but also of introspection and elucidation of its cognitive processes. This initiative underscores a commitment to an AI future where transparency is not an afterthought but a fundamental design feature, promoting a partnership between humans and AI that is built on trust and clarity.

The AI Revolution project by VERSES could very well redefine the timeline and trajectory of AI development, setting a course for a collaborative and comprehensible super intelligence that respects and enhances human capabilities, propelling us into a smarter world, responsibly and inclusively.

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