The AI Mind FAQ goes beyond the
Mind.Forth User Manual
and the JavaScript
Mind.html User Manual to provide deep
background information on the AI Minds and to anticipate
questions of a more technical or tangential nature.
1.2 How may I submit questions or topics for this FAQ?
The best way is to go into one of the public AI forums listed in the
Mind.html User Manual and tell the user community what you think should
be covered in the FAQ. You may also ask for correction of whatever you
think may be inaccurate or incomplete information. It helps if you use
the word "Mentifex" in your communication so that it may easily be found.
Whoever wishes may start and circulate a new FAQ independent of this one.
2 Mentifex AI in General
2.1 What is Mentifex AI?
Mentifex AI is the artificial intelligence project of the independent scholar
A.T. Murray (ATM) using the made-up Latin word "Mentifex" (mindmaker)
as a "user ID" on the Internet.
2.2
Why does Mentifex matter?
Mentifex AI matters (i.e., is worth looking into) for the following reasons.
It is based on a linguistic theory of mind and is therefore a
top-down "educated guess" approach to AI design rather than a
bottom-up "genetic algorithm" approach that could take eons to evolve.
It has produced working AI proof-of-concept software
that already thinks primitively in natural human language.
It shows the way to proceed with serious AI design in ways that may
look makeshift and clumsy at first glance but for which no viable alternatives
have become evident in the passage of ample time for candidates to emerge.
It solves the very core of the AI problem of how to engender thinking in a
machine so that subordinate problems (such as robot motor control) may be
solved after-the-fact and integrated step-by-step with the core functionality.
It is open source and free for the taking so that other AI entrepreneurs may
branch out from Mentifex AI as a point of departure in AI Mind evolution.
Other AI entrepreneurs have branched out from Mentifex AI in their own AI projects.
(Old ports of Mind.Forth and JavaScript AI before thorough debugging)
Mind.html is an artificial intelligence programmed in JavaScript.
It is meant to be a tutorial version of the Mind.Forth AI program.
4 The Mind.Forth Program
4.1 What is the Mind.Forth program?
Mind.Forth is an artificial intelligence written in Win32Forth and
intended for installation in autonomous mobile robots.
5 Theory
5.1 What is the Theory of Cognitivity?
The Theory of Cognitivity is an attempt to explain the thinking of
the human brain-mind as a black-box mechanism, using the inputs
and the outputs of the brain-mind as points of departure for a
mechanistic explanation of what internal behaviors might yield
the same sort of outputs based upon the same sort of inputs.
Since the Theory of Cognitivity is implemented in Mind.Forth and
in Mind.html, the theory and the software complement each other
to argue for the validity of the theory and to demonstrate the theory.
******************* Q & A to be worked into the FAQ
x.x How may I obtain the Mind.html program?
Just click on the
Mind.html link.
Was Mind.html designed by a committee?
No; Mind.html was designed by an individual.
x.x Why is Mind.html programmed in such a non-AI language as JavaScript?
The Mind program was originally programmed in Amiga ARexx, a version of the
IBM REXX scripting language. When
Mind.REXX first began to think and was
announced on Usenet in 1994, Forth programmers expressed an interest in
creating a Forth version of the AI Mind, so Mind.Forth was initiated.
In 2001, the JavaScript Mind.html version was created to take advantage
of the ease of simply clicking on a
Mind.html link to run the AI program.
Why does Mind.html use an intricate, associative neural net to store
words in the lexicon of the AI Mind? Why not just use a database?
In a database of words symbolizing concepts, it is hard to keep
a concept unified over time and to interlink concepts with
associative tags. An associative neural net is more difficult to
create, but it does the job better than a mere database.
Furthermore, a neural net is more brain-like than a database.
x.x What is the "slosh-over" effect?
x.x How hard is it to change the JavaScript Mind.html program?
Superficially, it is very easy to change. Algorithmically, it is harder.
x.x Why are there so many Web links embedded in the legend of the Mind Control Panel?
As a group, the links guide you to the most important background material on Mind.html:
AI4U; the Mind program; User Manual; Theory of Mind; Mind.Forth AI; AI Algorithm Steps.
You are free to substitute your own links in your own Web-hosting of the AI Mind.
x.x What citations of Mind.Forth or Mind.html are in the academic literature?
SIFPLAN Notices 1998 and 2004.
You could be an author of a scientific paper or dissertation on Mind.html.
Why do so many AI projects fail and never get anywhere?
Many AI projects fail because they are not based upon
a well-developed theory of mind. If they aim at some
aspect of intelligence less than a full-fledged mind,
they achieve at most an isolated tool for human minds
to use. If they attempt an Artificial General Intelligence (AGI)
or the equivalent of a mind, the projects are doomed to
failure if the programmers have no knowledge of
what they ought to implement.
Isn't it better to code bottom-up rather than top-down AI?
Maybe -- if you have millions of years to wait for results.
Why did you publish
Standards in Artificial Intelligence?
As individuals began to port Mentifex AI from Forth or JavaScript
into other programming languages, the need arose to promulgate
voluntary guidelines to keep people from "reinventing the wheel."
What other AI programs have been derived from Mind.Forth or Mind.html?
Franks AI Mind at
http://AIMind-i.com is one.