The riddles humans can solve but AI computers cannot

https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20240912-what-riddles-teach-us-about-the-human-mind

 

“As human beings, it’s very easy for us to have common sense, and apply it at the right time and adapt it to new problems,” says Ilievski, who describes his branch of computer science as “common sense AI”. But right now, AI has a “general lack of grounding in the world”, which makes that kind of basic, flexible reasoning a struggle.

 

AI excels at pattern recognition, “but it tends to be worse than humans at questions that require more abstract thinking”, says Xaq Pitkow, an associate professor at Carnegie Mellon University in the US, who studies the intersection of AI and neuroscience. In many cases, though, it depends on the problem.

 

A bizarre truth about AI is we have no idea how it works. The same is true about the brain.

 

That’s why the best systems may come from a combination of AI and human work; we can play to the machine’s strengths, Ilievski says.

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