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Definition: AI stages


AI stages, or levels, of development are defined by many people, and there may never be a real standard for the terminology. However, the following examples are common takes on the subject. See AI and AI in a nutshell.

1 - RULE BASED: clearcut rules. If this, do that. Expert systems were the first AI. See expert system.

2 - CONTEXT AWARENESS: system learns from past interactions. Examples are virtual assistants. See Siri and Google Assistant.

3 - DOMAIN SPECIFIC: highly skilled in a specific field such as chess or Go. See DeepMind.

4 - REASONING: resembles human intelligence. See ChatGPT.

5 - GENERAL INTELLIGENCE: self-awareness. See AGI.

6 - SUPER AI: outperforms humans in many areas. See AGI.

7 - SINGULARITY: computers make all the decisions. See technology singularity.


AI Uncovered Channel
The following is excerpted from "The 10 Stages of AI," a thought-provoking YouTube video.

1 - RULE BASED: if this, do that.

2 - CONTEXT BASED: recommendation systems.

3 - NARROW/WEAK AI: outperforms humans in single domain like playing chess.

4 - REASONING AI: solves problems on its own.

5 - ARTIFICIAL GENERAL INTELLIGENCE (AGI): can replace most humans.

6 - SUPERINTELLIGENT AI: improves itself.

7 - SELF-AWARE AI: a sense of identity.

8 - TRANSCENDANT AI: new digital and biological life forms.

9 - COSMIC AI: interstellar exploration and colonization.

10 - GODLIKE AI: rewrite reality.


Fewer Levels
AI is so overwhelmingly popular that there are many opinions.

0 - NARROW, NON-AI.

1 - EMERGING, NARROW AI

2 - COMPETENT NARROW AI equal to 50th percentile of skilled adults.

3 - EXPERT NARROW AI equal to 90th percentile of skilled adults.

4 - VIRTUOSO NARROW AI equal to 99th percentile of skilled adults.


The following was published in 2021 by Bernard Marr on LinkedIn. The explanations are excerpts.

1 - REACTIVE AI: recommendation engines, spam filters and chess playing.

2 - LIMITED MEMORY AI: historical data combined with programming to make predictions.

3 - THEORY OF MIND AI: meaningful conversation with an AI.

4 - SELF-AWARE AI: theoretical.


Another Version
The following from Harvey Ross in "AI in Plain English." The explanations are excerpts.

1 - SCRIPTED INTELLIGENCE: follow rules like software.

2 - REACTIVE AI: navigates environment in real time like robotic vacuum cleaners.

3 - LIMITED MEMORY AI: learns from limited historical data; a product recommendation.

4 - CONTEXT AWARE AI: learns from huge amounts of data like GPT models (see ChatGPT).

5 - THEORY OF MIND AI: robotic systems anticipate human needs.

6 - SENTIENT OR SELF-AWARE AI: makes autonomous decisions.

7 - SUPER INTELLIGENT AI: surpasses human intelligence.

8 - IMMORTAL AI: theoretical.