Computer Science

Modified: 2020-02-24

• Relevant Areas of Computer Science

• AI
  • Definition
    • The attempt to make computers perform intelligent actions.
  • Subfields of AI
    • Natural Language Processing
      • The attempt to get computers to understand spoken speech.
    • Chess and other games
      • Games are an old area in AI
      • Checkers and Backgammon are understood
        • Google: AI Checkers
      • Chess is falling fast (Deep Blue)
    • Robotics
      • "Hard AI"
      • Real world constraints
        
• Expert Systems
  • Another success of AI
  • Consist of knowledge base and inference engine
  • Knowledge Retrieval and Data Mining
    • Newer area
    • Consists of finding difficult to see patterns in large groups of data (i.e., stock market)
• Agents
  • Consist of software that can search a database
  • Many use the Internet as their domain
• Knowledge Representation
  • How is knowledge represented?
  • How do humans represent knowledge?
  • How should computers represent knowledge?
• Parallel Distributed Processing
  • Alternative to von Neumann serial design
  • Difficult to implement the software
• Machine Vision
  • Another difficult area
  • Problem is how to analyze and interpret the large amount of data that is collected
• Machine Learning
  • How can machines be made to learn for themselves (i.e., like children do)?
• Communication
  • Protocols
• Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) – used for data transmission
• User Datagram Protocol (UDP) – used by programs to send short datagram messages
• Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMP) – messages used for diagnostic or error-generating purposes
• Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) – application protocol that uses hyperlinks between nodes containing text
• Post Office Protocol (POP) – used by local email clients to retrieve email from a remote server over TCP IP
• File Transfer Protocol (FTP) – protocol to transfer computer files from a server to a client and vice versa
• Internet Message Access Protocol (IMAP) – a communication protocol used by email clients to retrieve messages from a mail server over TCP IP
• Human Computer Interaction (HCI)
  • Usability/User experience
  • Complex problem
  • Desktop metaphor
  • Social media
  • Videoconferencing
  • Ubiquitous computing
  • Kasparov and AI
    • 23 years after losing to Deep Blue (CS class watched live!)
    • Blessing (but first knowledge worker to be displaced by a machine, he says)
    • Only 4% of US jobs require creativity, he says
    • Radiology: rather have a nurse than a big MD star (challenge the machine)
    • Humans as shepherds to AI (nudging them)
    • Does not believe in AGI (artificial general intelligence)
    • Humans are evil, not machines (discussing ethical AI)
    • AlphaZero and Magnus Carlsen

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