Blog: Picking Our Brains: Can We Make a Conscious Machine?

Picking Our Brains: Can We Make a Conscious Machine?
New Scientist (04/06/10) Biever, Celeste

The effort to create artificial consciousness is gaining momentum. "We have to consider machine consciousness as a grand challenge, like putting a man on the moon," says the University of Palermo's Antonio Chella, editor of the International Journal of Machine Consciousness, which launched last year. The closest a software bot has come to attaining artificial consciousness may be the Intelligent Distribution Agent (IDA), which was created by the University of Memphis' Stan Franklin. IDA assigns sailors from the U.S. Navy to new jobs and must coordinate naval policies, job requirements, changing costs, and sailor's needs. IDA has both conscious and unconscious levels of processing. The updated Learning IDA was recently completed, and it can learn from past experiences as well as feel emotions in the form of high-level goals that guide the decision-making process. The University of Vermont's Josh Bongard has designed a walking robot that can maintain its function after being damaged. The robot has a continuously updated internal model of itself, which is considered a key part of human sentience and takes the robot closer to self-awareness. Meanwhile, the Carlos III University of Madrid's Raul Arrabales recently developed Conscale, a program that compares the intelligence of various software agents.

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