Understanding Exactly How We Make Decisions Is Helping AI Developers

In machine learning, a programmer might develop an AI that can calculate all possible consequences of a single action. Humans, however, don't have the same raw computational power; we have to efficiently create and execute a plan. We mentally invent different "layers" to organise our actions and then think about the higher levels rather than individual steps, according to a Neuron study from members of Google DeepMind and the University of Oxford. "The idea is basically to understand how humans or animals make long-term decisions," says Jan Balaguer, a PhD student at University of Oxford and member of Google DeepMind. "We're interested in trying to find machine-learning solutions to difficult tasks and real-life problems. Quite often it can be useful to draw inspiration from neuroscience."