"Weak AI" is Likely to Never Become "Strong AI", So What is its Greatest Value for us?
This work provides a conceptual framework for AI researchers and policymakers to understand and categorize AI advancements, though it is incremental in its analysis.
The paper addresses the distinction between weak AI and strong AI, arguing that weak AI is unlikely to evolve into strong AI, and explores the greatest value of weak AI despite this limitation.
AI has surpassed humans across a variety of tasks such as image classification, playing games (e.g., go, "Starcraft" and poker), and protein structure prediction. However, at the same time, AI is also bearing serious controversies. Many researchers argue that little substantial progress has been made for AI in recent decades. In this paper, the author (1) explains why controversies about AI exist; (2) discriminates two paradigms of AI research, termed "weak AI" and "strong AI" (a.k.a. artificial general intelligence); (3) clarifies how to judge which paradigm a research work should be classified into; (4) discusses what is the greatest value of "weak AI" if it has no chance to develop into "strong AI".