Page 24 - ARUBA TODAY

A24 technology
Tuesday 2 april 2019
No AI in humor: R2-D2 walks into a bar, doesn’t get the joke

By SETH BORENSTEIN writer for an Israeli version
WASHINGTON (AP) — A ro- “Saturday Night Live.”
bot walks into a bar. It goes Slonim put humor into the
CLANG. programming, figuring that
Alexa and Siri can tell jokes an occasional one-liner
mined from a humor data- could help in a debate.
base, but they don’t get But it backfired during ini-
them. Linguists and com- tial tests when the system
puter scientists say this is made jokes at the wrong
something to consider on time or in the wrong way.
April Fools’ Day: Humor is Now, Project Debater is lim-
what makes humans spe- ited to one attempt at hu-
cial. When people try to mor per debate, and that
teach machines what’s humor is often self-effacing.
funny, the results are at “We know that humor — at
times laughable but not in least good humor — relies
the way intended. on nuance and on timing,”
“Artificial intelligence will Slonim said. “And these are
never get jokes like humans very hard to decipher by
do,” said Kiki Hempelmann, an automatic system.”
a computational linguist That’s why humor may be
who studies humor at Texas key in future Turing Tests
A&M University-Commerce. — the ultimate test of ma-
“In themselves, they have This Monday, Aug. 1, 2016 file photo shows the humanoid robot “Alter” on display at the National chine intelligence, which
no need for humor. They Museum of Emerging Science and Innovation in Tokyo. is to see if an independent
miss completely context.” Associated Press evaluator can tell if it is in-
And when it comes to stand-up comedy, said said it turns out people thing mathematical that teracting with a person or
humor, the people who computer learning looks most appreciate a robot’s computers can grasp, Bish- computer, Slonim said.
study it — sometimes until for patterns, but comedy self-effacing humor. op said. Rayz has spent 15 There’s still “a very signifi-
all laughs are beaten out thrives on things hover- Ginger, which uses human- years trying to get comput- cant gap between what
of it — say context is key. ing close to a pattern and written jokes and stories, ers to understand humor, machines can do and
Even expert linguists have veering off just a bit to be does a bit about Shake- and at times the results what humans are doing,”
trouble explaining humor, funny and edgy. speare and machines, were, well, laughable. She both in language and hu-
said Tristan Miller, a com- Humor, she said, “has to asking, “If you prick me in recalled a time she gave mor, Slonim said.
puter scientist and linguist skate the edge of being my battery pack, do I not the computer two different There are good reasons to
at Darmstadt University of cohesive enough and sur- bleed alkaline fluid?” in groups of sentences. Some have artificial intelligence
Technology in Germany. prising enough.” a reference to “The Mer- were jokes. Some were not. try to learn to get humor,
“Creative language — and For comedians that’s job chant of Venice.” The computer classified Darmstadt University’s Mill-
humor in particular — is one security. Bishop said her Humor and artificial intelli- something as a joke that er said. It makes machines
of the hardest areas for parents were happy when gence is a growing field for people thought wasn’t a more relatable, especially
computational intelligence her brother became a full- academics. joke. When Rayz asked the if you can get them to un-
to grasp,” said Miller, who time comedy writer be- Some computers can gen- computer why it thought derstand sarcasm. That
has analyzed more than cause it meant he wouldn’t erate and understand puns it was a joke, its answer also may aid with automat-
10,000 puns and called it be replaced by a machine. — the most basic humor — made sense technically. ed translations of different
torture. “It’s because it re- “I like to believe that there without help from humans But the material still wasn’t languages, he said.
lies so much on real-world is something very innately because puns are based funny, nor memorable, she Texas A&M’s Hempelmann
knowledge — background human about what makes on different meanings of said. IBM has created arti- isn’t so sure that’s a good
knowledge and common- something funny,” Bishop similar-sounding words. But ficial intelligence that beat idea.
sense knowledge. A com- said. they fall down after that, opponents in chess and “Teaching AI systems hu-
puter doesn’t have these Oregon State University said Purdue University com- “Jeopardy!” Its latest at- mor is dangerous because
real-world experiences to computer scientist Heather puter scientist Julia Rayz. tempt, Project Debater , is they may find it where it
draw on. It only knows what Knight created the com- “They get them — sort of,” more difficult because it is isn’t and they may use it
you tell it and what it draws edy-performingrobot Gin- Rayz said. “Even if we look based on language and where it’s inappropriate,”
from.” ger to help her design ma- at puns, most of the puns aims to win structured ar- Hempelmann said. “May-
Allison Bishop , a Colum- chines that better interact require huge amounts of guments with people, said be bad AI will start killing
bia University computer with — and especially re- background.” principal investigator Noam people because it thinks it
scientist who also performs spond to — humans. She Still, with puns there is some- Slonim, a former comedy is funny.” q
In a first, electric cars outsell traditional ones in Norway

COPENHAGEN, Denmark (AP) — In of the market in the first three big incentives to boost electric car Scandinavian country be electric
a symbolic first, electric cars out- months of 2019 was 48.4 percent sales. by 2025.
sold fossil fuel-powered ones in and is expected to hover around It waived hefty vehicle import du- Countries around the world are
Norway last month. 50 percent for the whole year. ties and registration and sales taxes trying to encourage more people
Christina Bu, the Norwegian Elec- “Norway shows the whole world for buyers of electric cars to boost to buy electric cars as part of the
tric Vehicle Association’s general that the electric car can replace sales. Owners don’t pay road tolls effort to reduce carbon emissions
secretary, said Monday that 58.4 cars powered by gasoline and and use bus lanes in congested and fight climate change. China,
percent of new cars sold in the diesel and be an important con- city centers. the world’s biggest auto market,
country in March were battery- tribution in the fight to reduce C02 The perks, however, are to be has also provided big incentives as
powered, calling it “historically emissions,” Bu said in a statement. phased out in 2021. it tries to clean up the country’s air
high.” Norway, a wealthy European na- Norway’s Parliament has voted to pollution problem and gain a lead
Bu added that electric cars’ share tion of 5.3 million, has provided require that all new cars sold in the in new technologies.q