Why Google's AI is still playing Go

Just over a year ago, an artificial intelligence beat the fourth-ranked player in the world at Go, a complex and ancient game that is said to be a better test of the unique capabilities of the human brain than chess. Now, that same artificial intelligence, called AlphaGo, is preparing for its next public demonstration: a summit in China in May where it will collaborate with human players to come up with strategies, and then face off against the top-ranked player in a series of three matches. If it wins, it will have shown that its underlying algorithms are ready for something more than a game. AlphaGo is the product of DeepMind, a London-based division of Google parent company Alphabet. DeepMind was founded in 2010 around the goal of researching artificial intelligence in order to understand the nature of intelligence and harness the full power of computerized brainpower for humanity. Its experiments with Go -- a game thought to be years away from being conquered by AI before last year -- are designed to bring us closer to designing a computer with human-like understanding that can solve problems like a human mind can.