Carmine's Kernel

Spot the Bug on Channel 9

If you're a developer, check out this Spot the Bug post on Channel 9. These will appear every week or so (maybe longer intervals, depends on juiciness of the code sample). Enjoy and spot those bugs (there's a few of them...)!

Levels of Organization in General Intelligence

In order for Artificial Intelligence (AI) to be realized, a comprehensive understanding of general intelligence (human intelligence) must be achieved, but not necessarily replicated. What is intelligence, anyway? Eliezer S. Yudkowsky states: In humans, intelligence is a brain with a hundred billion neurons and a hundred trillion synapses; a brain in which the cerebral cortex alone is organized into 52 cytoarchitecturally distinct areas per hemisphere.  Intelligence is not the complex expression of a simple principle; intelligence is the complex expression of a complex set of principles.  Intelligence is a supersystem composed of many mutually interdependent subsystems - subsystems specialized not only for particular environmental skills but for particular internal functions.

He postulates that there are no simple set of rules we can use to define the complex process of thinking abstractly and further argues that unlike physics, the field of AI cannot succeed by condensing complexity into relatively simple expressions.

Read Yudkowsky's Levels of Organization in General Intelligence to learn more about the application of general intelligence in AI. Overall, it's an interesting read.

Thoughts?

Wise words from Lenn

Lenn Pryor, the creator of Channel 9, my boss and my friend shared some wise words today in a post entitled The value of a good umbrella and an even better safety net. All I can say is that it's been an honor working on "crazy" projects dreamed up by Lenn and I look forward to many more opportunities to prove naysayers wrong. I also extend my gratitude to the senior leaders at Microsoft who encouraged us to take a chance and protected us from harm's way. Einstein said that if at first it isn't absurd, then it probably isn't a great idea. Congratulations on the success of Channel 9, Lenn.

Autochthonous Life

The following ideas have lived in my head for a long time and were initially invoked as a result of understanding the compelling hypothesis put forth by James Lovelock and Lynn Margulis, the so-called Gaia Hypothesis which states that the cumulative effect of the metabolic, physical and chemical properties of living systems on Earth is a cybernetic system with homeostatic tendencies, tightly coupled to the planet's physical surface properties such as atmosphere and geology.

It occurred to me that not only was the core idea of this Gaian system plausible on Earth, but it was probably a signature of a class of life that exists in potentially large numbers of other worlds in the universe. It is unfortunate that a substantial segment of the scientific community still prefers to think of life as a consequential phenomenon with the advent of biological systems being extraterrestrial in origin and the impact life has on sustained planetary habitability and evolution as insignificant. The accepted idea seems to be that life on Earth exists as a result of some cosmic "seeds" planted on Earth during the age of bombardment (early on in Earth's history it was heavily pummeled by asteroids, some presumably carriers of life's essential chemical ingredients) coupled with randomly perfect conditions for "germination".

I, and others, disagree with this notion. Life, as amazing and wonderful as it truly is, is a planetry surface property that is bound both in advent and evolution to the planet upon which it happens. By looking at life in this way (from a systems as well as planetary perspective), the possibility of finding living systems (of the same class as Earth's) throughout the galaxy is very good. In the next 5-10 years we will have the instrumentation to start searching our galaxy for "life like ours" utilizing techniques of atmospheric spectral analysis combined with new telescopes.

In earlier posts I've briefly touched on Lovelock's approach to the detection of life on other planets. Does this life really need to be like ours? If so, to what extent? I argue that there are classes of life that exhibit similar behavior, but need not be composed of similar ingredients or design (like cellular genetic systems). So, then how do you define "life like ours"? Good question.

Life like ours can be defined as an autochthonous geobiological autopoietic cybernetic system. What?

In a nutshell: life like ours is a dynamic system, an adaptive planetary surface property, originating on the planet where it is found (tied to planetary formation and evolution), provides regulatory feedback mechanisms that ensure planetary habitability, and is remotely detectable via atmospheric spectral analysis due to dynamic atmospheric chemical exchange (life like ours perturbs atmospheres as a consequence of the processes associated with the daily business of living). Our class of life is a planetary-scale system composed of sub systems (animals, plants, microbes, cells, viruses, dna) that cumulatively, some more than others, act to ensure that Earth remains habitable for life. For this class of life, the particular composition and associated behaviors of sub systems are implementation details. Again, life like ours is a planetary surface property, just like the atmosphere, land and oceans. Astronomers like to say, and correctly so, that we are made of stars. Narrowing the scope a bit, it can also be said that we are made of Earth.

Can the Earth be used as a general model for rocky planets possessing autochthonous geobiologic surface properties?

Can a planet's surface be favorable for life without supporting autochthonous life forms?

Look into the light.

What will the 64-bit world look like?

With the advent of 64 bit processors and the operating systems that virtualize them, we are going to see some amazing new technologies emerge in the next 5-10 years. I had the pleasure of interviewing some folks involved in the 64 bit revolution today and really left the interview feeling excited about the future of applications and what we will be able to do on our personal computers thanks to powerful 64 bit processors coupled with cheap memory. You'll be able to see the interview on Channel 9 in a few weeks.

With 64 bit computing, there is no longer the 32-bit memory barrier that hampers things like fast analysis of very large datasets (because on 32-bit systems you can't hold them in-memory without causing significant perf problems or a dreaded out of memory exception...). Also, there is increased performance of the system generally due to the greater working address space. When apps start being written in 64-bit mode from scratch (that is, not ported from 32-bit), the possibilities of what we will see are truly compelling, like new types of games and powerful video/audio processing applications for your 64-bit laptop.

What new applications might we expect as a result of 64-bit computing?

Fractal branching ultra-dexterous robots

If you're into AI and robots, then you no doubt know who Hans Moravec is. He pretty much has set out to make better-than-human machines. I'm not really a robot guy, so I honestly didn't know too much about Hans and his work. Thanks to Jim Gray for tuning me into this. Really brilliant stuff. ( Maybe Hans will help me design TOS: Thinking Operating System :) )

Here's a quote from one of his papers on bush robots that nicely generalizes the notion of fractal hands:

"Once upon a time, the most complex animal was a worm. The stick-like shape was poorly adapted for manipulation and even locomotion. Then these stick-like animals grew smaller sticks, called legs, and locomotion was much improved, although they were still poor at manipulating. Then the smaller sticks grew yet smaller sticks, and hands, with manipulating fingers were invented and precise manipulation of the environment became possible.

Generalize the concept. Visualize a robot that looks like a tree, with a big stem, repeatedly branching into thinner, shorter and more numerous twigs, finally ending up in vast numbers of microscopic cilia. Each intermediate branch would have several degrees of freedom of sensed and controlled motion. Though each branch would be a rigid mechanical object, the overall structure would have an organic flexibility because of the huge numbers of degrees of freedom. At the outer extremes, the machine would have an enormous number of individually positionable and naturally swift manipulators, coordinated for simultaneous execution of otherwise unimaginable tasks by signals and power from the central regions."

Yes, I see.

Check out more of these papers on Bush robots. Enjoy.

Life: Beyond Carbon and Water

We generally make the assumption that carbon and water are fundamental ingredients required for the advent of living systems in the universe. Given that all the data we have to work with is based on the behavior of biologic systems operating on the surface of a single planet, this conclusion, from a purely scientific perspective, is based on insufficient understanding. If we define life as a pattern of physical behavior that is independent of its specific physical and chemical ingredients, then our current universal view of life’s required chemistry and supporting environment is truly suspect. One consequence of this change in perception will be seen in the Sagan-Drake “equation” for the estimation of intelligent life in a galaxy.

The estimation of the number of worlds harboring intelligent life would increase due to an increase in the number of planets capable of supporting biological systems (n_e; see below) if we remove the carbon and liquid water requirements (which implies specific temperature ranges) for the advent and evolution of life. There is no good reason why Carbon and water should be deemed universally necessary ingredients for the advent of living systems up to and including life forms that are capable of thinking in unusally abstract ways. After all, thinking is an electrochemical process (so we think, anyway). There is, however, one obvious reason to think Carbon and water are required components for life. It's what we have found to be the case here on Earth. So, better to rephrase what we are looking for out there: Life like ours. That focuses the question. It's always easier to look for things when you know what you're looking for. Still, if you want to look for something as broad as the notion of life in the universe you certainly can't base your search criteria on what works for a single planet. On to the Sagan-Drake equation (which is necessarily composed of some rather subjective variables).

The Sagan-Drake equation:

N = R^*f_pn_ef_lf_if_cL

Where

N is the number of intelligent communicating civilizations in the galaxy at present

R* is the average rate of star formation in our galaxy (stars/year)

f_p is the fraction of stars that have planetary companions

n_e is the number of planets per planet-bearing star that have suitable ecospheres (that is, environmental conditions necessary to support the chemical evolution of life)

f_l is the fraction of planets with suitable ecospheres on which life actually starts

f_i is the fraction of planetary life starts that eventually evolve to intelligent life-forms

f_c is the fraction of intelligent civilizations that attempt interstellar communication

L is the average lifetime (in years) of technically advanced civilizations

The notion that microbial life is abundant in the universe is certainly a compelling possibility ( requires a high value for  n_e ) if life is in fact an endemic planetary surface property with an evolutionary pattern that is tightly coupled to that of its planet. Perhaps the degree of bio-environmental coupling is a significant factor in determining if the development of intelligent complex life is possible. Certainly, if a planet harbors substantial life (present globally like here on Earth) then the evolution of the planet’s surface will be strongly coupled to that of its biology and the planet will maintain a surface environment capable of supporting life for periods of geologic time. Time, and lots of it, is a critical ingredient in advanced biological evolution. Or is it? I just ranted about the inherent problems with requiring Carbon and water for the advent and evolution of biological systems. Why this geologic time business? That's a good question. I don't have the answer. For now, let's just say that, regardless of specific chemistry and physics, it takes a long time for life starts to blossom into thinking creatures. I agree that this restriction may be too harsh.

Perhaps Mars is an example of a rocky planet that had sparse microbial life (relative to Earth) and therefore Martian biology had little net effect on the evolution of the Martian surface and atmosphere leading to a relatively short geobiologic lifespan and therefore no chance for the advent of complex life. Clearly, this is wild conjecture, but in the next 5 or so years we will probably know the answers to these Martian questions.

For detecting extraterrestrial life we should not only focus on whether or not carbon/water-based life forms can be supported on a rocky planet (geologically active and rocky surface (not a gas giant), like Earth, Mars, Venus and Saturn's wildly interesting moon, Titan), but whether or not a planet possesses surface properties that demonstrate a predictable pattern of behavior over time ( for example, a substantial and dynamic atmosphere (like the consistent addition and removal of Methane from Earth's or Titan's atmosphere) ) which is independent of the specific chemistry and physics operating on the geobiologic level. Now, if places like Jupiter's Europa support biological systems, then throw this paticular solution out of the nearest window since there is no way using this technique to remotely detect the presence of life that lives beneath the surface of a moon with no atmosphere in an ocean of salty water. It's certain that just looking at geologic patterns on the surface of a place like Europa will not provide enough evidence for the existence of life.

Detecting Titans

Seth Shostak got me to thinking.

Before NASA's Viking mission, atmospheric scientist, physiologist and inventor Dr. James Lovelock offered his assistance to NASA regarding how to determine if life is present on the surface of Mars or any other planetary body with a significant atmosphere: spectrographic analysis to see if it is chemically reactive. Life, it seems, has a tendency to perturb atmospheres such that chemical disequilibrium occurs.

The idea is that a planet without life on the surface will have an atmosphere in a state of chemical equilibrium (no longer reactive). The opposite will be true for planets harboring life (consider Earth's extremely reactive atmosphere and the ubiquity of life on its surface). This atmospheric entropy gradient is a signature of life.

We know this about Titan with certainty: its atmosphere is not in a state of chemical equilibrium. It is dynamic and chemically reactive.

What happened to OS research?

Think about this for a moment: The operating systems we all use on a daily basis, regardless of the particular flavor we prefer, are based on the same exact core principles and ideas that have been around for over twenty years.

Of course, we do see many high level innovations in consumer operating systems like Windows, OSX and Linux. New technologies like the CLR (it's what enables everything .NET), for example, represent significant innovation in the areas of virtual machines and software development in general. Systems are becoming more stable and reliable due to innovations at the kernel level. Computers themsleves, however, are not becoming smarter. They continue to be input-driven machines. There is little innovation happening at the OS level from a cybernetic point of view (adaptive regulatory feedback). It's as if operating system research, for all intents and purposes, has died.

I am not criticizing what we have today. My PC, for example, hasn't crashed in ages and does pretty much what I expect it to do. I am primarily concerned with the problem of what we will have tomorrow. How homeostatic and adaptive will operating systems of the future be if we, as a community, invest so little in the science of operating systems? Without significant basic research, what will drive OS evolution?

Ironically, the application of machine learning research to consumer operating systems is almost exclusively targeted at solving problems like automatic email prioritization, automated content management, automated software analysis, and other really nifty user features, which is great, but what about a machine capable of learning about itself and using this knowledge to better deal with perturbations and to further develop the ability to anticipate potential problems?

Addendum:

I am well aware that Intelligent machines have already beaten the world's best chess players, discovered abstruse mathematical theorem proofs, etc. Artificial Intelligence is primarily applied to robots not personal computers. I'm talking about the evolution of operating systems that run our PCs, not the software that drives the complex machinery of intelligent robots capable of thinking and reasoning. While the latter technology is on pace to usher in truly smart machines within the next 40 to 50 years, the former is frozen in a state of scientific stasis.

Why? What? Who?

Why are blogs interesting?

This is a question I've been asking since I first came into contact with the notion of blog. First off, I don't much like the sound of the word "blog". It's sounds like something you catch more than what it actually is: a powerful medium for overt personal transparency and even corporate marketing and public relational messaging.

Well, some of us just don't feel the need to share our lives with others. Why would you care that I did this or that yesterday and plan to do something else today? Certainly, this type of personal transparency is, on average, the least interesting stuff to share with strangers.

Why am I blogging?

I think human interaction in the abstract is very interesting and this is exactly what blogging is. It's just a really convenient and powerful way to share ideas and information with strangers. One very useful consequence of the advent of blogs is that we are now able to become contributors to various distributed think tanks. This is where I see most of the benefit of this phenomenon. The blogging culture that has emerged is far less interesting and in some circles seems to be more important than the actual content. Geeks can be generated in so many ways, it seems.

What's Carmine's Kernel?

This is a place where I will talk about intellectual interests that are core to me (my kernel). I will share what I have learned and what I am learning in the hopes that I can exchange ideas with (and learn from) others who are thinking similar thoughts.

Who am I?

I work for Microsoft as a Technical Evangelist and have been a software developer for 7+ years. Carmine is a nickname of mine that I feel best suits my core self. My educational background is in math, philosophy and planetary astronomy. I'm one of the people behind Channel 9. You probably hear the names Pryor and Scoble when Channel 9 is discussed in the media or at events, but there are others who play very big roles in making Channel 9 a success and I happen to be one of them. That said, I don't mind sitting in the back of the bus since I am better able to help plot our course without being bothered by things that live in the limelight.

I hope this place is of some use to you and that we can think together.