The Long, Uncertain Road to Artificial General Intelligence

Last month, DeepMind, a subsidiary of technology giant Alphabet, set Silicon Valley abuzz when it announced Gato, perhaps the most versatile artificial intelligence model in existence. Billed as a "generalist agent," Gato can perform over 600 different tasks. It can drive a robot, caption images, identify objects in pictures, and more. It is probably the most advanced AI system on the planet that isn't dedicated to a singular function. And, to some computing experts, it is evidence that the industry is on the verge of reaching a long-awaited, much-hyped milestone: Artificial General Intelligence.