Google Obtains Artificial Intelligence Startup DeepMind

[Josh Engen]

Google Obtains Artificial Intelligence Startup DeepMind

London-based artificial intelligence company DeepMind has been purchased by Google for $650 Million.

Since 2001, Google has acquired (or merged with) nearly 150 companies, but recently the search engine giant has become obsessed with robotics and artificial intelligence. Over the last two months, Google has purchased nine companies that fit into those categories, favoring robots over AI. And today, yet another company has been gobbled up.

DeepMind is a London-based artificial intelligence company that combines "the best techniques from machine learning and systems neuroscience to build powerful general-purpose learning algorithms." This is a fancy way of saying that DeepMind is attempting to make computers that think like humans.

"DeepMind was generally interested in reinforcement learning, and in deep learning, which is very useful in mining so called 'big data', something Google has a lot of and is interested in processing," said Murray Shanahan, a Cognitive Robotics professor at Imperial College in London.

Very few companies, if any, are sitting on more raw data than Google, so DeepMind's resources marry nicely with Google's current business structure. Plus, Google's recent fascination with robotics and artificial intelligence points to some interesting future projects.

DeepMind was reportedly purchased for $650 Million, which is an incredible figure when you consider that the company has only been around since 2010. So far, Google hasn't revealed how it plans to use DeepMind's technology. Though, a race of super-intelligent robot people seems obvious.

Source: The Guardian [http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/jan/27/google-acquires-uk-artificial-intelligence-startup-deepmind]

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[ZZoMBiE13]

Google, my friend and long time colleague, it's time for a chat.

I know you loved the Terminator films Google. I did too, truly. But that was a film to look to as a warning of a possible future, not a business plan to prepare your Standard Operating Procedures.

Google... buddy... you're becoming more and more like CYBERDYNE every day. This... I hate to say it... This is an intervention. You're hurting those who love you Google. You're scaring us. And we all gather here to support you and help see you through this.

Google, I just want you to know... [Message redacted for Android contract violation]

 

[Arnoxthe1]

Holy crap. Looks like Google's really kicking it into overdrive with their tech development. I wonder what exactly they're planning to release upon this world next?

...

Google Wave 2.0 and some more unneeded YouTube changes.

 

[Imperioratorex Caprae]

I'm going to throw my support toward any kickstarters involving an EMP generator, just because it seems prudent. I've always been against AI's, despite Terminator/SkyNET being fictitious, its a very real threat IMO. Yeah I'm paranoid, but its not without reason. And an AI hooked up to Google just seems like a bad idea considering it pretty much IS the internet more or less at this point.
Scary... so whenever I find an EMP project on some form of kickstarter, I'll be donating heavily towards it... as long as it isn't backed by google.

 

[Slash2x]

.... Oh Lord in Heaven help us if Google ever goes evil.... They are slowly chewing up smaller companies, As of right now at least they are being kind and free with the pocketbook when they do this... I hope to all hell that they never change...

 

[Baresark]

I would love to see the research DeepMind has accumulated. Usually, one of the main flaws in AI research is actually a fundamental misunderstanding of how human processing works (not like a computer at all, as so many people like to think it is). It's still hot research in the field of Neuroscience (try ignoring the bullshit the media does stories on and reading actual research by neuroscentists). As the company only started in 2010, I'm willing to bet they have a leg up on the competition.

 

[Saidan]

Yet another proof that Google is Skynet. Nuclear bunker prices will see a little raise this month, I think.

 

[kanetsb]

Um.......... Didn't they buy that robo-dog robotics company a couple of months ago? Now I'm worried.

 

[schrodinger]

uhh....*cough*

i'll just leave this here:

Spoiler

Yep, Google is totally going to build skynet and take over the world. We'll be forced to communicate through broken youtube and google+!

[HEADING=2]NOOOOOOOO![/HEADING]

 

[DaxStrife]

Google, please stop buying everything, it's starting to scare the peasants.

 

[Racecarlock]

I would have been scared if they had purchased something with sky in the name, but they purchased something with the word deep in it instead, so I think they're just trying to find the answer to life, the universe, and everything. It's 42, google. We already knew.

Although the captcha asking me how old my nonexistent children are is very disquieting. I'm going to go ahead and refresh that.

 

[FalloutJack]

Google, get real. You can't make it work. You're a conglomerate, and this sort of work requires genius.

 

[nuttshell]

...but they purchased something with the word deep in it instead...

Hmm...next big purchase, carefully planned by Google for years: Gainax!

 

[Crazy Zaul]

So Google is still LuthorCorp and able to spend infinite money.

 

[Therumancer]

*Shrugs* bring on the AIs I say. To be honest I'd like to see it happen, and really I could easily see things turn out more like Asimov's visions than "The Terminator" with a bit of work. By this I mean his books, NOT that travesty of a movie "I, Robot" which was an insult, pretty much doing the opposite of everything Asimov's works were about with the subject matter.

One thing I'm also fond of pointing out is that almost every AI uprising story starts with the idea of machines asking existential questions, some paranoid deciding to kill them all/pull the plug, and thus starting a war of survival. To be honest I'd see such questions as a bit of a success, and knowing they will doubtlessly occur, we should simply be ready for it, not do anything rash, and simply be ready to point out that we don't know the answers to a lot of the big questions ourselves, but pondering them is definatly proof that something is alive and truly self aware.

I'll also be blunt in saying that I think AIs and robots would be huge assets in space exploration, to the point of it being foolish to not develop the technology if we can.

 

[Strazdas]

remmeber when google was down for an hour and everyone panicked? i told you it was just skynet booting into the system as a joke. then they started buying robots, and it got just that much more scary.

 

[Olas]

As fun as it is to joke about this, one seriously has to question what Google's intention is here, they wouldn't buy up something like this for no reason.

 

[Double A]

I'm going to throw my support toward any kickstarters involving an EMP generator, just because it seems prudent. I've always been against AI's, despite Terminator/SkyNET being fictitious, its a very real threat IMO. Yeah I'm paranoid, but its not without reason. And an AI hooked up to Google just seems like a bad idea considering it pretty much IS the internet more or less at this point.
Scary... so whenever I find an EMP project on some form of kickstarter, I'll be donating heavily towards it... as long as it isn't backed by google.

I seriously feel the same way. At the very least, we need to always not be dicks to AI, not program them like humans (but with always good intentions), and some kind of kill switch that isn't actually a kill switch so they can't get pissed about it.