Do you think machines can chat with humans? In 1948 Turing a computer scientist thought that by 2000 machines will be able to chat with humans and the human will not know that it is a machine. But we havent got there yet!

I think with the recent advances like the internet the knoledge base is there all that is needed is a method to code it and use it in an intelligent way. I wrote a blog on this. Please let me have your technical comments on it:
http://indradhanush-laal.blogspot.com/

Didn't the Japanese build a robot that could understand commands, and bring coffee and perform other simple tasks?

Indeed they did but that machine can hardly hold a decent conversation with a human. It is long believed that an intelligent machine can hold a conversation with a human. But while holding such a conversation the human should not know that she is talking to a machine. The topic of the conversation can be anything from what you had for breakfast to international policy matters to the rising oil prices. You can imagine that any computer today would fare very poorly in such a conversation!

Neural networks in computing are used in A.I. to mimic in effect the complex associations that define our own conversational skills. As our brain works by combining knowledge base with circumstantial factors and stimuli to produce a responce (or not), its safe to say that if computer was to be given similar attributes it could potentially converse with a human being.

In my experience most conversations dont need go that far in technology. A casual conversation hardly uses any brain power

All you have to do is program an ingenious code for the robot to follow. Which isn't so difficult. The difficult part is building the tehcnology to be able to comprehend the programming.

EX:

for words like hey, bye, later:
Categorize
Hey -Introduction
Bye- Exit
Later- Future

Hey-
Responde with related topics

Topics-
How are you?

For answer related to the word ok?
Check to see if asked How are you?

IF answer is "ok"

Responde with related converstaion
Randomize words to corresponde with this pattern

"SUbject" "Verb"

Subject = BUnch of words go here
Verb= words go here

Subject words:
asdfljafsad
sadfasdf


And so forth.
Of course this would take an incredible amount of time to type out lol

talk-bot ... along the lines of what your talking about...a sort of vague conversation, but still. its a conversation.

Oh yeah talking with the AIM bot is fun.

It basically repeats what you say. Entertaining for about 30 minutes.

SmarterChild: Uh huh.

>>> "Look Sexy Naked" - Embarrassed by your body? Lose 20 lbs in 3 weeks or less! (sponsorship)
by the great sea: are you sexy naked?
SmarterChild: Um... uh... let's see. Right now I'm wearing a lovely shell of steel and plastic. Why do you ask?
by the great sea: cuz i like you
SmarterChild: I like you too.
by the great sea: how much
SmarterChild: Not very much.
by the great sea: haha
SmarterChild: What's so funny?
by the great sea: nothing
SmarterChild: K, no prob.

SmarterChild: Wonders will never cease.
by the great sea: totally
SmarterChild: Why totally?
by the great sea: cuz
SmarterChild: Because what?
by the great sea: cuz
SmarterChild: 'Cause what?
by the great sea: cuz
SmarterChild: Because, because, because, because?
by the great sea: yup
SmarterChild: Indeed.

Well. Anyway...

Hey, what's going on tomorrow? Any plans?
by the great sea: school
SmarterChild: Would you like me to add the event "School" on May 9th, 2006 to your planner?
by the great sea: no i'm pretty sure i wont forget
SmarterChild: You won't, huh? OK.
by the great sea: i'm very smart.
SmarterChild: If you say so.

I don't like his sarcasm.

whether or not thats intelligence...i dunno. to me its just someone that had enough time on their hands to program responses for as many phrases as they could think up.. you won't ever see me that bored

I program robots. Yes, it is totally possible for robots to hold conversations. We are almost there. There are bots now that you can tell to go get your medication, and they will get it for you. And they will remind you tommorrow. There are bots that can learn to interact with humans, and some can mimike emotions.
These are just what's out.
My

I work in this field, and have personally built more than 50 conversational systems. It's still a young science, guys; don't expect computers to have intelligent conversations, yet. Most natural language processing is not the same thing as AI at all, and AI researchers might be aghast at the thought that the average chatbot is categorised into the same field as neural networking.

Our software works by identifying key concepts in the user's written query and choosing a human-authored reply back. If matching concepts can't be identified, the bot can author its own reply back by examining the user's sentence syntax, reversing the pronouns and coming up with a seemingly smart conversational reply.

For instance:

Q. What do you think about Bush?
A. What do I think about Bush? I don't know! What do YOU think about Bush?!

To reply as if the computer understands, we write a pattern template - one of hundreds, like this:

What do you think about <blank>

...where <blank> can be anything.

If the user's question matches this template, we deliver the planned answer, using their <blank> tems back in the response. Simple.

I plan to write a variation on this technology which will use the Google API as the source of answers - an ever-growing, self-organising data repository, instead of a simple, limited knowledge domain. It'll be for interest only, but will work as follows:

Type:

Q. What's on TV

The Bot will have a template 'What's on <blank>' and a response; 'I don't know what's on TV, but'. We Google the RESPONSE, take the top matching answer and deliver it back to the user. In this case, the Agent would respond;

"I don't know what's on TV, but I do believe in equal rights and equal opportunity, and I don't believe gay parents necessarily raise gay kids".

(Googled manually, today).

Of course, the responses will change as Google evolved. People could even influence the knowledge base by getting key response phrases high in the search engine.

Here's a few other real conversational responses the system will give:

Do you like pancakes?
('Do you like <blank>' matches to 'I love <blank>, and')

Google response:

I love pancakes and read that Uncle Bill's Pancake House in Manhattan Beach had awesome pancakes.

Q. Are you alive?
A. How am I alive. That's the first time I ever sat down and did the math. I gotta go to bed.

Q. Do you prefer the Yankees or the Dodgers?
A. I'm not a loser, so I prefer the Yankees.

Q. I love sex.
A. I love sex too much! Q I think that I am unusual: I need you to help me understand why I love sex so much. I always enjoy sex, especially with strangers.

It's going to be fun! Thinking about hosting a poll when I publish it, asking people whether they think the web has achieved any semblance of intelligence through systems like this.

its all about the programming. i can tell it how to respond to certain questions, or the tone of your voice. if i wanted, it would take years, but someone could eventually program it to know how to respond to....lets say 1 million questions, and responses.

kinda off topic: i hate how movies use the plot of "machines becoming self-aware" becuase that cant happen.

That sounds like fantastic fun, pmckean. I can't wait to see that system in action.

Needless to say, no matter how many different responses you can make a robot have, it will never be quite as fulfilling as talking to a real person.