This article is the first in a series of three. See also: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3. Is it possible for a computer program to write its own programs? Could human software developers be replaced one day by the very computers that they master? Just like the farmer, the assembly line worker, and the telephone operator, could software developers be next? While this kind of idea seems far-fetched, it may actually be closer than we think. This article describes an experiment to produce an AI program, capable of developing its own programs, using a genetic algorithm implementation with self-modifying and self-improving code.

According to a recent study, machine learning algorithms are expected to replace 25% of the jobs across the world, in the next 10 years. With the rapid growth of big data and availability of programming tools like Python and R –machine learning is gaining mainstream presence for data scientists. Machine learning applications are highly automated and self-modifying which continue to improve over time with minimal human intervention as they learn with more data. For instance, Netflix's recommendation algorithm learns more about the likes and dislikes of a viewer based on the shows every viewer watches. To address the complex nature of various real world data problems, specialized machine learning algorithms have been developed that solve these problems perfectly.

Alight, so you have the NVIDIA CUDA Toolkit and cuDNN library installed on your GPU-enabled system. Let's get OpenCV installed with CUDA support as well. While OpenCV itself doesn't play a critical role in deep learning, it is used by other deep learning libraries such as Caffe, specifically in "utility" programs (such as building a dataset of images). Simply put, having OpenCV installed makes it easier to write code to facilitate the procedure of pre-processing images prior to feeding them into deep neural networks. Because of this, we should install OpenCV into the same environment as our deep learning libraries, to at the very least, make our lives easier.

In an effort to tap, and draft, the ever-evolving craft beer zeitgeist, a London-based microbrewery is using crowdsourcing and social media to tweak its recipes and give fans what they truly want. IntelligentX Brewing Co. offers "the world's first beer brewed by artificial intelligence" by using drinkers' opinions and an online feedback system to adjust recipes. "We've created a premium beer that uses complex machine learning algorithms to improve itself from your feedback," reads a statement on the company's website. "Because our A.I. is constantly reacting to user feedback, we can brew beer that matches what you want, more quickly than anyone else can." After sampling one of the company's four bottle-conditioned beers – golden, amber, pale, and black – fans are encouraged to share their thoughts via a Facebook chatbot.

Simply put: I'm a research scientist at MetaMind, acquired by Salesforce, where I poke datasets with the entropy stick and complain about deep neural networks converging too slowly. I graduated from Sydney University (BIT with First Class Honours & the University Medal) and Harvard University (Master of Science in Computational Science and Engineering). Before MetaMind, I was an engineer at the non-profit Common Crawl where I archived billions of web pages per month, the first employee at Grok Learning, data scientist at Freelancer.com, prodded Google App Engine at Google Sydney, and have been a tutor at the National Computer Science School for over half a decade.

Remember Cozmo, the cute little AI-powered robot that can recognize faces, become bored if you ignore it, or throw a tantrum when it loses a game? Turns out it's capable of far more than Anki, the San Francisco-based creators of the'bot, let on last week. On Monday, the startup announced the launch of a software development kit that will expose Cozmo's artificial intelligence smarts -- including facial recognition, positional tracking, and text-to-speech synthesis -- to any developer keen on tapping into them. Anki's motivations for doing so, explained Anki's president and co-founder Hanns Tappeiner at a showcase in New York City, are twofold. First, the company wants to distill Cozmo's deluge of mechanical parts, which include a gyroscope, accelerometer, cameras, a drop sensor, and four motorized joints, down to easy-to-understand functions that novice programmers can understand.

The Walt Disney Co. is kicking off the third session of its corporate accelerator this week, and revealed 9 new companies admitted to the program. A full list follows at the end of this post. The companies are developing everything from cinematic virtual reality and holographic content, to robots with human-like facial expressions. Because alumni of the Disney Accelerator have scored big partnerships with the media and entertainment juggernaut in the past, it is seen as one of the more desirable corporate accelerators out there. According to research by Future Asia Ventures, there are 131 active corporate accelerators worldwide today, with 13 new programs launching in the first half of 2016.

The Alphabet subsidiary is partnering with a UK hospital to test whether its algorithm can help diagnose diabetic retinopathy and age-related macular degeneration sooner. Diabetic retinopathy and age-related macular degeneration are serious conditions that can lead to loss of eyesight, and they affect more than 100 million people across the globe. The good news is that early detection can minimize the damage, but the bad news is that diagnosis can often take time. Now, Google DeepMind, a subsidiary of Google parent company Alphabet Inc., hopes to speed up the process by applying artificial intelligence. Optical coherence tomography, a noninvasive imaging technique that can produce 3-D scans of the eye, as well as digital scans of the back of the eye can be used to diagnose both diabetic retinopathy and age-related macular degeneration.

Vivek Wadhwa has been named to the Carnegie Mellon University College of Engineering faculty as a distinguished fellow on its Silicon Valley campus, the Pittsburgh, Pa.-based university recently announced. In his role, Wadhwa will be teaching classes in exponential technologies, technology convergence and industry disruption, and the new rules of innovation. He will also be researching technologies and helping members of the Pittsburgh faculty connect with the Silicon Valley. "CMU is doing some of the most advanced research in areas such as robotics, artificial intelligence, Internet of Things, autonomous cars and almost every field of engineering and bioengineering," Wadhwa said in an emailed statement. "This will provide me direct access to the amazing faculty and enable me to help them make a much greater impact on the world."

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, at left, with Jeff Immelt, CEO of GE. (Photo: Brian Smale) Microsoft and GE are joining forces to use cloud technologies in industrial production. GE will bring its Predix industrial data-gathering operating system to Microsoft's Azure cloud computing platform, the two companies announced Monday at the Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference in Toronto. The deal is the first in a planned strategic partnership between GE and Microsoft. "Every industry and every company around the world is being transformed by digital technology," said Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella in a statement announcing the partnership. "Working with companies like GE, we can reach a new set of customers to help them accelerate their transformation across every line of business -- from the factory floor to smart buildings."