Uncertainty, Procrastination and Artificial Intelligence

Neil D. Lawrence

Queens’ College SCR Talk

Philosophical Essay on Probabilities Laplace (1814) pg 3

\[ \text{model} + \text{data} \stackrel{\text{compute}}{\rightarrow} \text{prediction}\]

If we do discover a theory of everything … it would be the ultimate triumph of human reason-for then we would truly know the mind of God

Stephen Hawking in A Brief History of Time 1988

loneliness

overcrowding

birth


Glider (1969)

Loafer (2013)

Philosophical Essay on Probabilities Laplace (1814) pg 5

Lap Engine (1788)
total energy
=
available energy
+
temperature
\(\times\)
entropy

Betrand Russell
Albert Einstein
Norbert Wiener

James Clerk Maxwell
Ludwig Boltzmann
Josiah Willard Gibbs

Velocity-bin entropy:

Velocity-bin entropy:

Score:
Energy:

Claude Shannon

bits/min billions 2,000
billion
calculations/s 		~100 a billion
embodiment 20 minutes 5 billion years

One thing is I can live with is doubt, and uncertainty and not knowing. I think it’s much more interesting to live with not knowing than to have an answer that might be wrong.

Richard P. Feynmann in the The Pleasure of Finding Things Out 1981.

Coales, J.F., Kane, S.J., 2014. The “yellow peril” and after. IEEE Control Systems Magazine 34, 65–69. https://doi.org/10.1109/MCS.2013.2287387
Einstein, A., 1905. Über die von der molekularkinetischen Theorie der Wärme geforderte Bewegung von in ruhenden Flüssigkeiten suspendierten Teilchen. Annalen der Physik 322, 549–560. https://doi.org/10.1002/andp.19053220806
Heider, F., Simmel, M., 1944. An experimental study of apparent behavior. The American Journal of Psychology 57, 243–259. https://doi.org/10.2307/1416950
Laplace, P.S., 1814. Essai philosophique sur les probabilités, 2nd ed. Courcier, Paris.