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Professor R. Narasimhan: Birth Centenary

 

                  Painting created by MS Copilot using a Photograph of RN I had taken 

Professor R. Narasimhan: Birth Centenary

Much has been written about Professor R. Narasimhan (RN) — computer pioneer, institution builder, and one of the sharpest minds of his generation. Anyone looking for dates, milestones, and achievements will find the Wikipedia article useful. His book, “Artificial Intelligence and the study of Agentive Behaviour” contains selected papers he had published.

This piece is not about that RN!

This is about the RN I knew as a person — my mentor, my PhD co‑guide (along with Professor J. R. Isaac), and a remarkable human being whose influence shaped my early academic life.

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Lunches, Conversations, and a Curious Mind

RN was a true gentleman, and a natural magnet for researchers from wildly different fields. Most afternoons, you could find him in the TIFR West Canteen, talking to computer scientists and biologists, and an occasional psychologist, radio astronomer, or nuclear engineer at a six-seater table. I was lucky to be part of that circle.

These were not casual lunch-table chats. RN was deeply fascinated by cognitive psychology and brain sciences. He believed — long before it became fashionable — that artificial intelligence must learn from animal and human behaviour and the functioning of the brain.

Because of this, our table had biologists more often than physicists. Many of them were studying C. elegans, the tiny millimetre-long worm with just 302 neurons that still manages to learn and remember. RN loved that fact. It fit perfectly with his conviction that understanding simple biological systems could illuminate the future of AI.

My friend Ramesh Sinha from Radio Astronomy would join us sometimes. And occasionally, M. R. Srinivasan — founder-chairman of the Nuclear Power Corporation — would walk from his office across the street and sit with us. He was RN’s friend.

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Bananas, Cheese, and a Life of Simplicity

RN had a small ritual at the end of lunch. He would buy two bananas and a cube of cheese from the canteen, wrap them carefully in paper napkins, and take them home. That was his dinner.

There was something touching about that simplicity. “High thinking, modest living” was not a slogan for him — it was his way of life.

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NCST Days and Guest House Stories

Later, when many of us from the TIFR Computer Group moved out to create the National Centre for Software Technology (NCST), RN became a key member of our Governing Council. After retiring from TIFR, he moved to Bangalore but continued to visit NCST and stay in our guest house.

The guest house had two rooms. On rare occasions, RN had to share it with another Governing Council member — an eminent computer scientist I will call Prof 2.

I lived on the same floor, so I often heard the stories.

RN had a strong dislike for house lizards. If he spotted one, he would immediately call the building watchman to come and chase it out. The guest house had a common bathroom, and Prof 2 once told me that RN politely asked if he could take his shower first. “I don’t like a wet bathroom,” he said.

These small moments captured the man perfectly — brilliant, disciplined, gentle, and quietly particular about the things that mattered to him.

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Looking Back from Today’s AI World

When I think back to those lunches and conversations about brains, behaviour, memory, and learning, I feel a quiet pride. RN’s focus and judgement were decades ahead of its time.

Today’s AI revolution is based on artificial neural networks — ideas that echo the very biological inspirations RN had urged us to pay attention to.

---

Srinivasan Ramani
April 17, 2026

P.S.: I had written the first version of this article but had asked MS Copilot if it would help in improving the long sentences and passive sentences. Copilot did that but had the gumption to go further and offer to create a “polished, blog‑ready, informal version of my article — warm, readable, and faithful to my voice”. It offered to keep it “conversational, reflective, and lightly narrative, the way a personal centenary tribute should feel”.

I said “go ahead. Here is my article,” and gave it the text of my article. What you see above is the version Copilot produced! Then, I asked it to produce a painting-like image from a photograph of RN. I had that image two minutes later! I have reproduced it above.

I wish RN were here to see the levels AI has reached!

 

AI is the surest way to global catastrophe humanity has so far invented!

 

                            This image was created as per my description by Microsoft Copilot on April 10, 2026

From Anderson, J., & Rainie, L. (2026). Building a human resilience infrastructure for the AI age. Imagining the Digital Future Center, Elon University. Pages 67-68

‘AI is the surest way to a global catastrophe humanity has so far invented. ... Can we create a new movement for moral and ethical considerations before the AI hurricane destroys half of humanity?’

Srinivasan Ramani, an Internet Hall of Fame member, previously research director at HP Labs India and professor at the International Institute of Information Technology in Bangalore, wrote: “I confess to being an AI aficionado – I have been one since 1964. My education and research experience make me a critical observer, not a blind fan. I have been a daily user of the Microsoft Copilot for more than a year. It applies semantic dimensions to understand what a user is talking about and has the fluency to make occasional flattering remarks, showing off a form of personality! Its access to resources encompassing a vast swath of human knowledge – including history, science, arts, medicine and technology – makes it a powerful collaborator at work. Its problem-solving abilities include the capability to implement all published algorithms, heuristics and approximate methods while also staying aware of even today’s news. Copilot can now do the bulk of the routine work that researchers and writers do. It surely has increased my productivity and helped me troubleshoot problems in my daily life.

However, I believe that AI is the surest way to global catastrophe that humanity has invented to this point. We are not a mature society globally, and yet we have acquired extremely dangerous weapons. When people are running away from a city under bombing, rarely do they think of their neighbours. So, I doubt that humanity can come together to agree on effective international cooperation against malevolent AI.”

‘I have hopes that a new movement could create a new morality to help us confront the challenges. ... The rarity or uniqueness of anything like the human civilization in all the observable universe could inspire many people to join the proposed movement. Humanity would be most un-intelligent if it creates such a unique civilization and then fails to save it from destruction.‘

“We have no warning system for specific dangers and we have no treaties like the ones that confronted mutually assured destruction by nuclear weapons in the late 20th Century. Safeguards and treaties against runaway AI may come in 10 years, but that may be too late.

Innovative technologies for use in intercontinental navigation in the 15th century onward made popular scientific theories such as the Copernican Heliocentric theory and threatened formal religion. We should not underestimate a similar threat to religious beliefs being the result of developments in AI.

The biggest threat is to our economic and social structures.

The concept of jobs as the mechanism for providing an income and survival is under threat. The mechanism of taxing individuals’ income to provide the bulk of government expenditure is also under threat. Do all human beings have an inherent right to incomes irrespective of their employment? Does this right cover all regions of the Earth, or is it confined to residents of economically advanced nations? This question threatens our political foundations.

Traditional pedagogies force students to learn a lot of information and knowledge just in case they may need it during their lives. AI has trashed these pedagogies, by giving information and knowledge on demand. The pace of change in most fields of human endeavour make it meaningless to restrict learning to the first quarter of one’s life. New pedagogies need to be evolved to teach all people to live in a turbocharged world in which they must learn to change and adapt all their lives.”

“I think like an engineer, clinging to hope at the worst of times. I will be thinking of solutions to problems till my last breath. So, let me describe my hopes.

The power of compounded earnings makes me believe that poverty may not be as big a threat as it has been in the past. The problem is a moral one. Do most people recognize that the speed of social and economic change is already extremely high? Can we create a new movement for moral and ethical considerations before the AI hurricane destroys half of humanity?

I have hopes that a new movement could create a new morality to help us confront the challenges. I take hope from the green parties which have had a degree of success in earning public support to face the threat to sustainability of human life on Earth. The rarity or uniqueness of anything like the human civilization in all the observable universe could inspire many people to join the proposed movement.

Humanity would be most un-intelligent if it creates such a unique civilization and then fails to save it from destruction.”

Srinivasan Ramani
Retd. Professor, IIIT Bangalore

Microplastics in Food

Microplastics in Food

Animals foraging for food is a common sight in India. Cows are often seen feeding on garbage in urban streets in India. A pitiful sight is that of cows eating plastic along with discarded food.

There is a belief that milk from a cow milked in your sight, and consumed soon after, is healthier than processed milk, which is supplied commercially.  Fortunately, most of this fresh milk is boiled before consumption. If consumed without cooking, this practice can pose a risk of tuberculosis.

In rural areas, it is common to see cows, goats, sheep, pigs, and chickens foraging for food. All this raises the suspicion that non-vegetarian food in India could contain microplastics.

What can you do about this? There are several ways to detect microplastics in food [Velebit et al, 2023]. A simple method is:

1) Digest meat tissue using chemicals like KOH or H₂O₂ to isolate microplastics.

2) Use membrane filters to collect particles.

3) Screen for visible microplastics using a magnifying glass or a low-power microscope. There is a lot of interest in microplastic particles smaller than 10 micrometres. These may need to be viewed under a regular microscope.

Meat, pork, chicken, and fish can all be tested using this method. Eggs are less likely to have microplastics.

What about vegetables?
[Conti GO, et al, 2020] reports that vegetables and fruits often have a large number of microplastic particles. Apples and carrots are reported to have the highest particle counts. The method described above should work for both vegetables and fruits.

Srinivasan Ramani

Reference:
Velebit, B., Janković, V., Milojević, L., Baltić, T. and Ćirić, J., 2023. Overview of microplastics in the meat: occurrence, detection methods and health effects. Scientific journal" Meat Technology", 64(2), pp.36-41.
https://meatcon.rs/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/MeatCon-2023-Special-Issue.pdf#page=48

Conti GO, Ferrante M, Banni M, Favara C, Nicolosi I, Cristaldi A, Fiore M, Zuccarello P. Micro-and nano-plastics in edible fruit and vegetables. The first diet risks assessment for the general population. Environmental research. 2020 Aug 1;187:109677.
Micro- and nano-plastics in edible fruit and vegetables. The first diet risks assessment for the general population - ScienceDirect

 

 

R Narasimhan Centenary

 

Prof RN (April 17, 1926 – September 3, 2007) is well-known as the designer and implementor of India’s first digital computer, the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research Automatic Calculator (TIFRAC). He was also the founder of the Computer Society of India. Wikipedia has a comprehensive article about RN that is easily accessible.

However, another part of his life has been known only to professionals in the field. This part deals with language behavior, visual pattern recognition, Vision in animals and machines, and Artificial Intelligence. I will discuss a few significant questions in this research area and RNs' positions. It is incredible how his views have stood the test of time.

The role of syntax  

RN pioneered exploring syntactic methods in visual pattern recognition, which was appropriate to the context in pattern recognition with which he was first involved—bubble chamber images [RN, 1964] and [RN, 1966]. However, His interest in vision continued for years [Reddy and RN, 1971], [Barlow et al, 1972]. He was not tied down to syntactic methods.  

Soon after this, he became more interested in natural languages.

Theories of Language

Noam Chomsky’s work on transformational grammars was very influential from 1965 to 1985. Chomsky believed language is primarily a formal system governed by innate structures rather than a repository of encyclopaedic knowledge.

However, RN did not fall for the temptation to follow the stream. He recognized the importance of going beyond syntax and dealing with context, multi-sensory learning, and the pragmatics of language use. He gave special attention to language learning by children.

RN stressed phylogenetic continuity. He found it difficult to believe that language behavior suddenly appeared in homo sapiens. It is more likely to have evolved gradually from animal communication.

RN published two books collecting his work together [RN, 1998] and [RN, 2004].  

Limitations of automated logic

Symbolic AI focuses on representing knowledge in structures that can be manipulated by a machine to carry out deduction and induction. This works with toy worlds but fails to deal with the real world. Can automated deduction go beyond stored knowledge and explain common sense? RN said no. He accepted the importance of deduction and induction, but felt that common sense goes beyond these.

RN believed in paradigmatic behavior, which is driven by analogy.

Geoffrey Hinton, often called the “Godfather of AI,” has recently offered a provocative perspective on human cognition. In an interview [Hinton, 2025], he has declared that humans are fundamentally “analogy machines,” not the reasoning beings we often perceive ourselves to be.

Role of language in problem solving

As a Research Associate at the Computer Group at TIFR, I was fortunate to learn from RN’s work and publications. His special interest in language as a tool led me to explore “Language-Based Problem Solving” for my thesis, guided by Prof RN and Prof JR Isaac [Ramani, 1971]. I was working with a computer (CDC-3600) with much less memory than the cell phone I now use! The idea of language models was not well developed then, though we were writing programs that spun out stories, correct in content and grammaticality, based on ad hoc probabilities. Multi-layer neural networks and the transformer model were decades away. However, I could implement pattern matching to solve problems by analogizing from a few examples.

Learning from the Nervous System

RN was inspired by the work of Hubel and Wiesel at Harvard.

Their discovery of feature detectors in the visual cortex of cats supported his conviction that understanding perception and cognition required a multidisciplinary approach.

His paper [Barlow et al, 1972] is memorable, emphasizing his conviction that studying the human nervous system and human behavior is essential for progress in AI.

RN’s unique style:

RN never had set goals for publication for himself or those he guided. This eliminated the need to follow research fashions of the day, or to go journal hunting to find some journal that would accept whatever one had written. Integrity in research requires that you have truly significant results before you publish. These principles have made RN’s positions on research issues relevant over the decades. The coming decade is expected to be an AI decade, with highly accelerated progress in science, technology, and medicine. I wish that RN were here to enjoy the progress!

References

[RN, 1964]
Labeling schemata and syntactic descriptions of pictures, R. Narasimhan, Information and Control, Volume 7, Issue 2, 1964, Pages 151-179, ISSN 0019-9958,
https://doi.org/10.1016/S0019-9958(64)90087-7.
(https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0019995864900877)

[RN, 1966]
Syntax-directed interpretation of classes of pictures. Communications of the ACM, 9(3), pp.166-173. 1966.

[Reddy and RN, 1972]
Reddy, V.S.N. and Narasimhan, R., 1972. Some experiments in scene analysis and scene regeneration using COMPAX. Computer Graphics and Image Processing, 1(4), pp.386-393.

[RN, 1981]
Narasimhan, R., 1981. A Framework for Modelling Behavior. In Modelling Language Behavior, pp.1-26.

[RN, 1998]
Narasimhan, Rangaswamy. Language Behavior: Acquisition and Evolutionary History. India: SAGE Publications, 1998.

[RN, 2004]
Narasimhan, Rangaswamy. AI And the Study of Agentive Behavior. India: Tata McGraw-Hill Publishing Company Limited, 2004.

[RN, 1997]
Narasimhan, R., 1997. Knowledge processing and commonsense. Knowledge-Based Systems, 10(3), pp.147-151.

[Ramani,1971]
Ramani, S., 1971, September. A Language-Based Problem-Solver. In IJCAI (pp. 463-473).

[Barlow et al, 1972] Barlow, H.B., Narasimhan, R. and Rosenfeld, A., 1972. Visual Pattern Analysis in Machines and Animals: The same principles may underlie the operation of sensory neurons, computer programs, and perception. Science, 177(4049), pp.567-575.

[Hinton, 2025]
Geoffrey Hinton’s interview on April 23, 2025 at the University of Toronto
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vpUXI9wmKLc

                     

Photo Credit: https://nationaltoday.com/international-ideas-month/

Students at the University of Wisconsin-Madison proposed in 2020 that March be observed as the International Month of Ideas. Visit https://nationaltoday.com/international-ideas-month/

The first celebration was in 2021, but in 2022 Covid-19 caused havoc. The event had to be celebrated over the net, which was a good thing. Now it is accessible to everyone with a smart phone!

Imagine adding a patent or a paper to your CV. This will set you apart as a rare person who shows creativity. Perhaps a set of students in a college should organize an event named the “Ideas of March” on the 31^st of the month when selected ideas would be presented to an audience.

A committee could award the ideas selected a first Prize of Rs 1000, a second prize of Rs 500, and two third prizes of Rs 250. Many colleges have student chapters of professional societies, and they have small budgets. A requirement should be that the candidates submit their ideas in written form. The submissions may not meet the requirements of a patent application or an academic paper. However, the selection committee would prefer submissions that are good drafts for patent applications or academic papers.

An R&D professional could be asked to give a talk about the company's patent and publication-related activities.

While such an event would be fun, the focus should be on encouraging everyone in the audience to develop and record their best ideas. The future will see a tremendous growth of ideas. Our world of 8.2 billion people filed 3,552,100 patent applications in 2023. However, many were utility model patents, called petty patents or innovation patents in some countries. They are given patent protection only for 6 or 7 years.

Utility patents meet a higher standard. They cover new and useful processes, machines, articles of manufacture, compositions of matter, or any new and useful improvements, and are given patent protection for twenty years.

China produced 1,642,507 patent applications in 2023, the US made 518,364, and India produced 64,480. However, Indian patent applications showed 15.7% annual growth, while Chinese patent applications showed 3.6% yearly growth. You can visit www.wipo.int for more information.

What is meant by the phrase “the Ides of March”? Could you search for it?

Srinivasan Ramani 

Double the value of your solar panels

 

The ideal space for locating solar panels is a small part of a residential colony: the terrace of buildings, which should be out of bounds to residents and free from shadows. Such isolated areas are valuable not only for collecting solar energy but also for collecting rainwater.

How much rain does India get in a year? 1083 mm, according to World Bank data. If you set apart 1 Sq M of collecting area, you can get the volume of water calculated as

Area in Sq M X Rainfall in Meters/year X Efficiency

The efficiency question arises because of evaporation, leakage, etc. Getting an efficiency of 60% seems reasonable. Using the data and the formula given above, we arrive at a figure of

1 X 1.083 X 0.6, or roughly 0.65 Cubic Meters of water. If you set apart 30 Sq M of collection area per resident in an apartment building, you can collect 19.4 Cubic Meters of water per year, approximately 53 Liters/day per resident. It's not luxurious, but we can survive on that.

In a world in which climate change threatens our water resources, we cannot afford to ignore rainfall water collected on building roofs and terraces. Plans for future buildings must provide for collection and filtering. Designing and manufacturing solar panels to enable this will be essential for overall efficiency.

The double-duty solar panels should be able to withstand rain and let it run into the water collection system. They should not contaminate the water. They should also function efficiently as solar energy collectors soon after the rain stops.

Given the importance of solar panels for sustainable living, researchers must focus on cost-effective and reliable ways of turning solar panels to face the Sun. This will be near impossible on sloping tiled roofs but should be possible on the terraces of multi-story apartment blocks. The designs should consider at least the sun's daily movement. However, it is worth noting that the Sun also moves annually. A quarterly manual turning could take care of this.

Srinivasan Ramani

Self-sustaining Wells: Rainwater Conservation

 

 

                                       

A plastic water tank to collect rainwater

   This image was created by Microsoft’s Co-pilot 

Self-sustaining Wells for rural areas

Imagine a shallow well 7 feet deep and about 7 feet in diameter, designed to collect and save rainwater. If there is 100 cm of rain per year, the well could collect 30,000 liters of water, enough for the needs of four adults for six months, at 40 liters per day per person. A small hand pump would be sufficient to pump out 160 liters/day. The well could easily built using pre-fabricated reinforced cement parts.

Rainwater entering a well usually leaks out and adds to the groundwater. In the case of self-sustaining wells, we need to reduce water leaks as much as possible by design. Wellwater evaporates, so SS Wells should be completely covered at the top. 

But how does rainwater get in? We build a small collection tank 13 feet long and 13 feet wide with a tiled surface. This tank needs only to be 6” deep.  It would have to slope so rainwater falling into it will run to a corner. The water will go through a filter and run into the well below.  A float-based water-level indicator would be a valuable addition. 

On days when it does not rain, people who wish to sleep in the open can sleep in the water-collection tank.  

Scaling down the solution

One way is available to provide a fraction of the benefits at a fraction of the investment. Plastic tanks that can hold 1000 liters of water are available in the market in plenty. Imagine if their top cover is replaced by a concave version with a filtering device so rainwater can be collected and stored in the tank. This will provide drinking water for a small family for several months. This solution has the advantage of being very easy to implement.

An App to use when you run into a stupidly designed Website

 

Image from ciphr.com through Wikimedia Commons, CC by 2.0 Licence 

We often encounter poorly managed Websites, and waste hours trying to carry out a simple transaction online. Your blood pressure goes up, you shout at people at home who try to help, and you barely preserve your sanity for the day. I offer an excellent design for an App you can use on these occasions. A possible name for it is Constru, as it has a constructive intent.

The App consists of two parts:

a) Maintains your sanity by letting you curse the manager concerned

b) Helps you publish constructive suggestions.

Maintain your sanity.

People do not realize it, but curses serve a great purpose: maintaining sanity under pressure! However, you cannot publish a curse on a feedback page, email, or whatever. The wonderful law may punish you for doing that.

Don’t worry; our App’s first section allows you to register curses in the privacy of your cell phone in an encrypted form. Curses are stored only on your phone. You can always read back the curses you have registered in your life, giving the date, time, and name of the party concerned. I give two sanitized examples:

11-03-2024 11 AM. Party: --- Retail: You are a bunch of idiots!

12-03-2024 12 noon. Party: --- News portal: Hope you are fired before you get your next salary!  

Of course, the App will register all kinds of curses, including unsanitized ones.

Publish constructive suggestions.

11-03-2024 11 AM. Party: --- Retail: The local phone number given for contacting you does not work. I searched the Web for a contact number for your company. That number rings and rings and does not answer.

12-03-2024 12 noon. Party: --- News Portal: You should not have so many advertisements popping up that the user does not get any news to read in peace.

As the person who will implement the App and run a business based on it, you must make a few decisions:

a)   Should the Website where the constructive suggestions are published indicate that there is a separate, unpublished part where curses have been recorded?

b)   Should the constructive suggestions always indicate the sender’s name? Or should this be done only when the user concerned permits it?

c)   Should you moderate constructive suggestions so that you do not get you into legal issues?

d) Should your users register by providing an email address or a phone number that your system verifies?

Srinivasan Ramani

 

Improving the Design of Ceiling Fans

Ceiling fans seem to attract dust from the air. Even a little trace of oil in the air due to cooking in the kitchen causes the dust on the fans in all rooms to become a thick greasy deposit. The dust deposits seem to form mainly on the upper surfaces, and leading edges of the fan blades. A lot of time gets wasted cleaning fan blades. In addition, cleaning fans is a risky operation as people climb on plastic chairs and flimsy stools. Visit this newspaper report for an example of a death from a fall. 

https://www.ahmedabadmirror.com/woman-falls-to-her-death-while-cleaning-ceiling-fan/58565865.html

We believe that fan makers should do adequate R&D to reduce the need for cleaning ceiling fan blades. Making fan blades very smooth is one way to reduce grime collection. Preventing the build-up of static electrical charges is another. Do fan blades need painting? Perhaps blades made of stainless steel would be worth testing. They should not need painting.

High-end cameras use a technique to get dust off the sensors. When you switch off the camera, the sensor vibrates for a short time to shake off the dust. We should consider using this technique with fans. It is worth trying aerodynamic techniques which will make the fans self-cleaning to some extent.

K Chandrasekar and Srinivasan Ramani
Chandrasekar is a wildlife expert and a wildlife photographer. 

Artificial Intelligence: A Perspective

Artificial Intelligence: A Perspective       Guest Article 

Pramode Verma^*
*Professor Emeritus of Electrical and Computer Engineering, The University of Oklahoma, pverma@ou.edu 
[see Author Capsule Bio below]

“Pre-publication article copy", to appear in the December 2023 edition of the Journal of Critical Infrastructure Policy.

 In some ways, Artificial Intelligence (AI) has already started the next technological revolution. Compared to the past technological revolutions like the printing press (1436), the steam engine (1759), automobile (1672), or the information technology (1960s), the AI revolution appears to be different.

Critical analyses of the potential of AI are showing up everywhere at an increasingly rapid rate. Scientists and technologists are working hard to continuously enhance the potential of AI to match, possibly exceed, the capabilities normally attributed to humans. Social scientists, on the other hand, are struggling to develop adequate safety mechanisms that will limit the damage AI can inflict on unsuspecting individuals or organizations. The euphoria to push the bounds of AI to higher levels in the servitude of mankind appears to have suddenly given way to the fear of a dark outcome looming on the horizon.

Human intelligence aided by machines when put into practice has consistently benefited mankind. Is AI a tipping point where machine intellect might be too good for humanity? This letter attempts to address ways in which AI can inflict damages and proposes how the damages can be contained, if not eliminated.

Artificial Intelligence is by no means a new endeavor. Dating back to the 1950s, AI researchers have tried to create machines that could mimic or surpass the capabilities of humans. Until most recently, AI was viewed as offering a human-machine continuum with a flexible boundary. The flexibility depended on needs of the task and the human element responsible for the task.

The generative properties of AI have challenged this notion. Generative AI can draw pictures, write a book, compose a poem, or generate text with little guidance. Generative AI is based on patterns and similarities in the underlying data and the relationship to its label or descriptor. Machine learning continuously enhances the depth and scope of such relationships by mining the massive amounts of data that Generative AI has access to along with the contextual application of relationships.

AI algorithms are driven by techniques used by neural networks. The algorithms use autocorrelation techniques choosing the most likely word, phrase, or icon based on the statistical analysis of hundreds of gigabytes of Internet text. The repertoire of information is growing at an exponential rate thus enhancing the capabilities of AI. In many instances, the outcomes delivered by Generative AI, have surprised the developers, and surpassed their expectations.

Can AI replace human beings in their entirety? This remains an open question because humans also display consciousness, feelings, emotions, and sensations. Some of these attributes arise because of the intricate relationship between mind and body. Furthermore, the sensory mechanisms of the human body are complex and distributed and include such attributes as touch, taste, and smell. While it’s possible to build mechanisms to mimic these features in a robot, possibly in a limited way, the potential benefits of such an undertaking are questionable from a commercial perspective. Artificial Intelligence applications in the day-to-day businesses are the major drivers of the science and technology of AI currently.

How should one regulate AI? Given the fact that AI is driven by algorithms and processing capabilities along with access to massive amounts of data, the innate growth of AI is unstoppable. We posit that regulation of AI should be looked upon from the perspective of those who it has the potential to inflict damage on. In other words, rights of the recipients who AI can hurt should drive the AI regulation.

The ability of AI to create misinformation is potentially its most damaging outcome. Unfortunately, no one can control the ability to generate misinformation any more than one can control the thought process associated with human beings. Once generated, misinformation can be delivered through the Internet on a person-to-person basis or through a broadcast medium. Another compelling example is misinformation generated by a database, such as a medical database, which is delivered to an inquiring customer over the Internet. The availability of instantaneous transport of misinformation worldwide adds to the gravity of the situation.

Let’s first consider misinformation delivered over the Internet. The most important part is to positively identify the sender at the behest of the receiving entity. This can be accomplished through a variety of means. One possibility is the use of public and private keys. However, the computational overhead consumed in such a scheme will likely make it unattractive to most consumers.

An alternative is to require every ISP to positively identify its customer. The receiving entity in such a network should have the choice to require the network to forward information from only those entities whose vetted credentials are forwarded along with the message. This contrivance should not violate the freedom of speech or expression; it merely empowers the receiving entity to limit access to it by an unknown or an unapproved entity. And it’s no more limiting than locking the door of your home to strangers.

The positive identification of a client by the entity to which the client has a relationship is prevalent among many institutions. In financial institutions, it’s known as the Know Your Customer (KYC) requirement.  The implementation of forwarding the sender’s identity to a discerning receiver should not be difficult. Any digital device connected to the Internet can be uniquely identified by the network through its Layer 2 address. This can be supplemented by the Layer 3 address (such as a password) that can uniquely identify an individual, a process, or an institution. Indeed, this positive identification is already implemented by financial institutions. This identification can be forwarded to a discerning end point.

Let us now take up the case of broadcast media. Such media are, in most countries, regulated. The regulation can easily require that that any content the medium broadcasts has been vetted for the authenticity of the content originating entity. This can be displayed as part of the broadcast.

The third element that requires regulation is access to publicly available databases using Artificial Intelligence. One leading example is a health-related database that is publicly available. Such databases should be vetted by the concerned regulatory bodies or public institutions at large. A database, for example, answering queries related to health should be measured and rated for the level of accuracy it delivers in its response by the medical establishment of the country.

In some ways, human intelligence has grown too fast for the good of humanity. Every time technology has enhanced our capabilities to produce goods at a level unimaginable with human labor alone, there have been collateral damages.

Like any new technology that comes into practice, AI will cause collateral damage. There will be job losses especially for the most vulnerable members of the society, e.g., those who cannot easily adapt to changed modes of operation such as the elderly or those disadvantaged in other ways. Since AI is so heavily dependent on digital literacy, countries that are less literate in technology will be left further behind. And increased resource gaps between and among nations is not a good option for humanity as a whole.

Undoubtedly, AI will be growing closer and closer to the human brain, even possibly surpassing it. Arguably, it already has. As to whether it reaches the human mind which shows consciousness, instincts, and feelings, we do not know currently.

Author Capsule Bio

Pramode Verma is Professor Emeritus of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the Gallogly College of Engineering of the University of Oklahoma. Prior to that he was Professor, Williams Chair in Telecommunications Networking, and Director of the Telecommunications Engineering Program. He joined the University of Oklahoma in 1999 as the founder-director of a graduate program in Telecommunications Engineering. He is the author/co-author of over 150 journal articles and conference papers, and several books in telecommunications engineering. His academic credentials include a doctorate in electrical engineering from Concordia University in Montreal, and an MBA from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. Dr. Verma has been a keynote speaker at several international conferences. He received the University of Oklahoma-Tulsa President’s Leadership Award for Excellence in Research and Development in 2009. He is a Senior Member of the IEEE and a Senior Fellow of The Information and Telecommunication Education and Research Association. Prior to joining the University of Oklahoma, over a period of twenty-five years, he held a variety of professional, managerial and leadership positions in the telecommunications industry, most notably at AT&T Bell Laboratories and Lucent Technologies. He is the co-inventor of twelve patents.

Learning from the Rat-hole miners of India

 

India heaved a sigh of relief when rescue workers brought out 41 trapped men on the 28^{th of} November 23. We owe a big thank-you to all agencies involved, led by the National and State Disaster Management agencies. The last two days of the 17-day rescue saga had some important lessons.

The rescuers called in the army along with six rat-hole miners, who specialize in working in confined and dangerous spaces. They succeeded where heavy, modern machinery had failed. These were high performance auger machines that work like giant corkscrews with a drilling head and a corkscrew mechanism to send the debris back.  They failed in Uttarkashi where the tunnel under construction had collapsed. The machinery was to bore a hole 80 to 90 cm in diameter. The plan was to insert steel pipes in the drilled hole and bring out the trapped workers through them. The problem was that the collapsed rubble had steel items like ladders and pipes buried in it. These obstructions damaged the corkscrew like blades of the auger and made it stop.

However, six rat-hole miners could drill through 10 meters of the rubble in 24 hours, using only hand tools. The newspapers screamed that this was a case of men succeeding where machines failed. I would argue that there is some other lesson here for us.

Big augers and cranes usually lack feedback. Imagine a man in a hurry trying to break down a latched door using bare hands. He could fracture his hand. The rat-hole miners could see and sense resistance from buried metal. They could call in teams handling plasma metal cutters to cut the metal items into pieces that could be removed. I believe that engineers should now incorporate computer vision devices, strain gauges and even sound recognition capabilities into heavy machinery like boring machines.

One possibility is to add a video-camera to the system so that the machine operator at the back could see the area being drilled and make intelligent decisions on how to proceed. A sound-processing subsystem could recognise sounds indicating problems and alert the operator. 

Srinivasan Ramani

29-11-2023

A link between Covid-19 vaccination and Vitiligo?

  The photo above has been used only for illlustration. It is unrelated to the Covid-19 question 

It would have been controversial to raise questions about the Vaccination-Vitiligo link while the Pandemic was raging. Now that the Pandemic is under some control, we must seek the truth.

There are plenty of articles I could locate with Google Scholar reporting incidents that suggest there is a link. For instance,

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9538607/

Vitiligo is recognized as an auto-immune phenomenon. Vaccinations, in general, have been associated with auto-immune reactions.

There have been two new cases of vitiligo among my acquaintances in the last two years. In both cases, the person involved had taken Covid-19 vaccinations.

A major epidemiological study is called for. The study should also cover possible associations with gender, age, ethnicity, socio-economic factors, and nutritional factors so that we will understand conditions under which a causative phenomenon is identified.

Srinivasan Ramani

Colonizing the Moon

 

This is a project that will surely be implemented in one form or another during the 21^st Century. The political stakes are too high for any superpower not to attempt it. It is also a necessary step towards the real challenge – Colonizing Mars.

It will be a while before you can buy business class tickets to the moon and back! All you can do now is what millions of immigrants have done in the past; go to a faraway land with no guarantee of return. A project that plans only a one-way trip is far simpler than one that aims for a safe return trip soon.

A one-way trip will find many volunteers above the age of 50 if they believe that life expectancy of astronauts in this project would be at least 20 years from the beginning of the lunar trip.

This means that the project design should aim to keep risks low enough to give a good chance for its crew to live 20 years or more on the moon. This may not be that difficult, given that a NASA astronaut Mark Vande Hei has spent 355 days on the International Space Station (ISS), beating the previous record by 15 days.

The project may take various forms, but I will outline one possible form below, to throw light on the feasibility of the idea.

Constructing infrastructure before human’s land

The project could begin with the design and fabrication of several electrically operated mini-earth movers, say with a one-meter blade to dig trenches on the moon. They should be computer driven and be capable of carrying out a few tasks autonomously, with some remote supervision such as

1)      digging a trench 4 meters wide and 4 meters deep, to build underground living quarters for the pioneers.

2)      depositing cement/concrete type of lining on the walls and floor of the trench.

3)      move prefabricated slabs to build a roof for the trench.

4)      level a patch of the lunar surface, say in the shape of a hexagon or octagon, within a circumscribing circle 12 meters in diameter.  

A few earth movers and construction material would first be sent using an unmanned lander. The earthmovers under remote control from the earth would build a landing area for the manned landing, and an underground trench which would ultimately become underground quarters. The trench can be finished later, after the project team arrives. The lander should ideally be designed to serve as the initial residence and be available later as an alternative residence to meet contingencies.

The layout of the lunar base should be highly modular. It should grow over a period to include multiple landing zones connected by trenches. Some trenches would be residential, and some would house equipment like batteries. Yet others would have transparent roofs to raise crops like lettuce, tomatos, spinach, mushrooms. The crops would be kept alive during the lunar nights by ultra-violet lighting. This effort to grow food would be considered experimental and would not be depended upon to ensure crew survival.

Replenishments

It would take a long time to harvest any oxygen or water that is available on the moon. The project should ensure that unmanned supply spaceships are sent every quarter. We know from the experience with the ISS that water, such as urine, and carbon dioxide in the air arising from human breathing can be recycled, reducing the need for oxygen and water to be replenished from the earth. Taking all this into account, it might be sufficient for the project to send a few tons of replenishments every quarter, including oxygen, water, food and other needs.

The lunar base should have adequate storage facilities to store six months of oxygen, water, and food, to face any contingencies.

Power

ISS generates approximately 100 KW of power. The lunar base should ideally generate 300 KW of power and have adequate battery capacity to last out a whole lunar night.

Project Staff and what they will need to do

Planning, selecting, and training a team for this project would be the most critical requirement. The team will need to have a variety of requisite skills and adequate redundancy so that more than one or two personnel are available to handle any situation. One of them must be a doctor, who can handle minor surgery if need arises. He will require a store of medical supplies and equipment, including an X-Ray machine and an ECG instrument. Engineers to handle all systems and communicators who can anchor videos for TV broadcasting on earth would be necessary.

Role assignments should ensure adequate rotation, and time to do exploratory work in their specialist areas: searching for lunar resources, developing farming techniques, operating specialized equipment such as a moon-based telescope to send data to observers on earth, etc. Everyone should have the opportunity to do creative work and publish their findings, as this would be their major reward. Of course, they should be paid a salary.

Growing the colony

While we may not be able to plan a return to earth as of now, we might be able to add to the project staff by sending one or more small teams over a period as the infrastructure is extended.

Recycling is a fundamental requirement for maintaining any lunar base. For instance, consider the small landers that would arrive every quarter. They need to be reusable. One option is to make them vehicles for lunar exploration. With no significant air drag, and with a gravity one-fifth of what we experience on earth, such vehicles would be practical to hop a few dozen miles at a time. Choice of suitable landing sites, and stability after touch-down would be basic requirements they should meet. Extendable legs could increase stability. A longer-term solution would be for prefab slabs that could be carried during initial trips to build small landing pads at different places. Each landing pad would be say, 3 meters by 3 meters in size.

Infrastructure Building

A Lunar Positioning System (LPS), like the GPS we all use, can easily be created for the moon. A few satellites in an analog of the Geostationary Equatorial Orbit would be needed to cover most of the surface of the moon. A few polar satellites in lunar orbits would be necessary to serve the polar regions. Ideally, all these should be created by international cooperation and be available to teams from all nations.

In fact, the whole project would benefit from multinational cooperation and investment.

Srinivasan Ramani

 

 

Freedom of Speech and Generative AI

Photo Credit: Mirko Tobias Schaefer, CC BY 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons "https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bios_robotlab_writing_robot.jpg"><img width="512" alt="Bios robotlab writing robot" 

Freedom of Speech and Generative AI

I will not tangle with court opinions on what constitutes free speech for human beings. However, I have a few opinions of what anonymity should be offered to Generative AI. Suppose the law says that generative AI systems should watermark all the output they create digitally in such a manner that everyone's browser can in principle mark such material as "Produced by Generative AI". One result would be that students cannot submit such material to their teachers and claim credit as if it was their own writing. Ideally, the watermarking should identify uniquely the system that authored the material concerned. This provision should cover all output of Generative AI systems including images.

Secondly, watermarking would inform every user of the Internet as to the origin of text they rely upon – was it created by a human or a machine. 

We have enough of fake news already, and we do not need to have it produced in industrial quantity! For instance, if this safeguard was in operation now, no confusion would have been caused by a synthetic image showing a massive smoke column near the Pentagon https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7mWXhGfTyso

In conclusion, I am not ready to confer citizenship on Generative AI systems.

Srinivasan Ramani 

RIP Turing Test

 

The context of this article is the Turing Test. If you have not read on this topic, you could look it up on the Wikipedia. I would also suggest you read articles on the Loebner Prize which is related. Visit

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loebner_Prize and

https://analyticsindiamag.com/leobner-prize-platform-test-chatterbot/

 I spent sometime today "talking" to Chat GPT through the Chrome Browser. Many of my questions were "why" questions such as "Why is the sky blue?". One question was "What would happen if ice were to be dense enough to sink in water?" I was quite impressed by the responses. I would advise readers never to use a chat interview to hire an employee. They could be using a mobile device to ask Chat GPT while talking to you on a laptop. Has an artificial intelligence passed the Turing Test? I do think so.

 I did not use professional tricks to look for weaknesses in the conversation. Does my conversational counterpart identify contradictions in what I said some time ago and what I say now? Is it fooled by ambiguous statements, puns, etc.?

Instead, I asked straightforward questions. I could not completely avoid asking factual questions that could be answered by store-and-forward techniques, or by a web search. I was curious to know the answers for a few questions I felt are the ones likely to stump search engines.

I also did not look to see if I could make the counterpart to say something wrong. To err is human, and you don’t throw out an AI for making the kind of mistake a human could easily make. 

I list a few questions I tried and the responses I got from Chat GPT. You may also wish to read my post on this topic on Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/srinivasan-ramani-3a273a16_chat-gpt-and-artificial-intelligence-i-activity-7012857929619959808-9gxD?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop

Is there any logic in the relative positions internal organs are found in the abdomen?

Yes, there is logic in the relative positions of the internal organs in the abdomen. The organs are arranged in the abdomen in a way that allows them to function efficiently and effectively.

For example, the digestive organs (such as the stomach, small intestine, and large intestine) are located in the lower part of the abdomen, near the pelvis. This allows gravity to assist in the movement of food and waste through these organs.

The liver, which plays a role in processing nutrients and producing bile, is located in the upper right part of the abdomen. The spleen, which is involved in the immune system and the production of red blood cells, is located in the upper left part of the abdomen.

The kidneys, which are responsible for filtering waste products from the blood and regulating electrolytes, are located in the back part of the abdomen, on either side of the spine.

Overall, the relative positions of the internal organs in the abdomen reflect the functions that they serve and the physiological needs of the body.

what is a micromort?

A micromort is a unit of measurement used to express the risk of death associated with a specific activity or event. It is defined as one in a million chances of death, and it is often used to compare the relative risks of different activities or events. For example, a person who skydives might be considered to be taking on an average of one micromort of risk, while a person who drives a car might be considered to be taking on an average of 0.1 micromorts of risk per hour. Micromorts can be useful for comparing the risks of different activities or for understanding the relative risks associated with different events or activities.

 

What is the risk of drinking one unit of whiskey in micromorts?

It is difficult to quantify the exact risk of drinking one unit of whiskey in micromorts (a unit of measurement used to quantify the risk of death from various activities), as the risks associated with alcohol consumption depend on a variety of factors, including the individual's age, weight, and overall health, as well as the amount of whiskey consumed and the context in which it is consumed. However, it is generally accepted that the risk of death from alcohol consumption increases with the amount of alcohol consumed. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the risk of death from alcohol consumption is estimated to be 0.1 micromorts per drink for men and 0.2 micromorts per drink for women. One unit of whiskey is typically equivalent to one shot, which is approximately 1.5 ounces. Based on these estimates, the risk of death from consuming one unit of whiskey may be approximately 0.15 micromorts for a man and 0.3 micromorts for a woman. However, these estimates are based on the assumption of a standard serving size and may not be accurate for all individuals. The risk of death may also be higher if larger servings of whiskey are consumed.

Chat GPT is not Goof-Proof

The computation of risk of alcohol consumption above is a bit wonky! Read the response given to the question on the risk of flying, below. The arithmetic is wrong. However, I think a good fraction of the human population would not notice this mistake unless they take a flight that runs into the risk discussed!

What is the risk of a flight in micromorts?

A micromort is a unit of measurement used to represent a one-in-a-million chance of death. It is typically used to evaluate the relative risk of different activities or events. The risk of a flight, in terms of micromorts, depends on a variety of factors, including the type of aircraft, the duration of the flight, the route taken, and the weather conditions.

Generally speaking, the risk of death during a flight is quite low. According to data from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), the overall fatality rate for commercial flights in the United States is about 0.07 per 100 million miles flown. This equates to a risk of about 7 micromorts per 100 million miles flown.

However, it's important to note that the risk of a flight can vary significantly depending on the specific circumstances. For example, flights over long distances or to remote locations may have a higher risk due to the potential for technical issues or other unexpected events. Additionally, flights in smaller or older aircraft may have a higher risk than flights in newer, larger aircraft.

Overall, it's important to recognize that flying is a relatively safe mode of transportation, but like any activity, it does carry some risk. It's always a good idea to take steps to minimize the risks associated with flying, such as choosing a reputable airline, following safety instructions during the flight.

Omniscience

For an intelligence to hold what looks like a good conversation in a Turing Test, it needs the ability to deal with a human language. It also needs the ability to organize the discourse, that is, to shape the flow of communication to make sense. It has taken decades for AI researchers to make necessary advances in this direction. Meanwhile the Internet has brought us something close to omniscience. There was a time when scholars of language said world knowledge was impossible to put into a system as it seemed to be huge. So, they limited their theories to syntax and limited semantics.

Now, as long as a system is able to benefit from human language text, practically everything known by people everywhere can be accessed by it. Practically all public knowledge is available to an artificial intelligence.  My question below and Chat GPT’s response to it demonstrate how extensive this knowledge-reach has become. Even though I am a Tamil speaker, I did not know the meaning of the name Thirumazhisai.  Chat GPT explained this to me.

Tell me about Thirumazhisai

Thirumazhisai is a town located in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu, in the district of Kanchipuram. It is known for being home to the ancient Thirumazhisai Azhwar Temple, which is dedicated to the Tamil saint and poet known as Thirumazhisai Azhwar. The temple is an important place of worship for Hindus, and it is believed to have been built during the 8th century.

Thirumazhisai Azhwar was one of the twelve ancient saints known as the "Azhwars," who are revered in the Vaishnavite tradition of Hinduism. He is known for his devotional poetry, which is considered to be some of the most important works in Tamil literature. The Thirumazhisai Azhwar Temple is a popular destination for pilgrims who come to pay their respects to Thirumazhisai Azhwar and to seek his blessings.

In addition to the Thirumazhisai Azhwar Temple, the town of Thirumazhisai is also home to other places of cultural and historical significance, such as the Vellappar Temple and the Chola-era stone inscriptions at the Thirumazhisai Koothanur Temple. There are also several small local businesses and markets in the town, which contribute to the local economy.

What does the word thirumazhisai mean?

The word "Thirumazhisai" is derived from the Tamil language and is believed to be named after the Tamil saint and poet known as Thirumazhisai Azhwar. The name "Thirumazhisai" is believed to be a combination of two Tamil words: "thiru," which means "sacred" or "holy," and "mazhisai," which means "poet." Therefore, the word "Thirumazhisai" can be translated as "sacred poet" or "holy poet." It is also the name of a town located in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu, which is named after the temple dedicated to Thirumazhisai Azhwar.

I promise to discuss this topic in one or two more future posts on this blog

There is more to talk about. I talked to Chat GPT (my nickname for it is Chatpat!) about feelings. It seems to have clear views on why it does not need to have feelings of its own. However, it agreed with me (or should I say Shee agreed with me? It seems inappropriate to call an intelligent system “it”) that it might have to understand our feelings in order to serve us better. Shee clearly said that she does not need to have feelings of her own for understanding of feelings of users!

Has humanity created its own successor? Yes, it seems so. AI systems can be designed to last a few billion years if we work really hard! Besides, these systems would be able to transmigrate themselves to new bodies over telecom when it becomes necessary!  

What next?

Some of you may study the feedback contest mentioned on the Chatpat website and perhaps participate in it.

Some of you might want to do projects related to this whole area. I will keep all this in mind when I plan my future blogposts.

Meanwhile, many of you may not agree about AI not needing feelings. Would it not be good for them to have empathy? And perhaps, curiosity? Should they not have something like mental activity when they are not conversing with a human? Or should they be talking to each other, or “learning” through the Internet? 

Srinivasan Ramani