An exciting new study from the University of Sheffield and published in the journal Swarm Intelligence has demonstrated (free pre-print version) a method of allowing computers to make sense of complex patterns all on their own, an ability that could open the door to some of the most advanced and speculative applications of artificial intelligence. Using an all-new technique called Turing Learning, the team managed to get an artificial intelligence to watch movements within a swarm of simple robots and figure out the rules that govern their behavior. It was not told to look for any particular signifier of swarm behavior, but simply to try to emulate the source more and more accurately and to learn from the results of that process. It's a simple system that the researchers think could be applied everywhere from human and animal behavior to biochemical analysis to personal security. Alan Turing was a multi-talented British mathematician who helped to both win the Second World War and invent the earliest computers, both while leading the Allied code-breaking efforts at Blechley Park.

Alan Turing was a multi-talented British mathematician who helped to both win the Second World War and invent the earliest computers, both while leading the Allied code-breaking efforts at Blechley Park. However, this impact on history may have been even greater through his academic work; his seminal paper On Computable Numbers laid down the foundations for modern computer theory, and his thinking on artificial intelligence is still some of the most influential today. He devised the famous Turing Test for true AI: if an AI can endure a detailed, text-based interrogation by a human tester or testers, and those testers cannot accurately determine whether they are speaking to a human or a robot, then true artificial intelligence has been achieved. With all we now know about the ability of neural networks to find patterns in behavior, this does seem like a somewhat low bar to consciousness -- but it's easy to remember, historically important, and it has alliteration, which means it's famous.