How AI could become an extension of your mind | Arnav Kapur

177,573 views ・ 2019-06-06

TED


Please double-click on the English subtitles below to play the video.

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Ever since computers were invented,
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we've been trying to make them smarter and more powerful.
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From the abacus, to room-sized machines,
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to desktops, to computers in our pockets.
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And are now designing artificial intelligence to automate tasks
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that would require human intelligence.
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If you look at the history of computing,
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we've always treated computers as external devices
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that compute and act on our behalf.
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What I want to do is I want to weave computing, AI and internet as part of us.
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As part of human cognition,
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freeing us to interact with the world around us.
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Integrate human and machine intelligence
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right inside our own bodies to augment us, instead of diminishing us or replacing us.
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Could we combine what people do best, such as creative and intuitive thinking,
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with what computers do best,
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such as processing information and perfectly memorizing stuff?
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Could this whole be better than the sum of its parts?
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We have a device that could make that possible.
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It's called AlterEgo, and it's a wearable device
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that gives you the experience of a conversational AI
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that lives inside your head,
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that you could talk to in likeness to talking to yourself internally.
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We have a new prototype that we're showing here,
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for the first time at TED, and here's how it works.
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Normally, when we speak,
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the brain sends neurosignals through the nerves
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to your internal speech systems,
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to activate them and your vocal cords to produce speech.
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One of the most complex cognitive and motor tasks
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that we do as human beings.
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Now, imagine talking to yourself
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without vocalizing, without moving your mouth,
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without moving your jaw,
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but by simply articulating those words internally.
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Thereby very subtly engaging your internal speech systems,
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such as your tongue and back of your palate.
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When that happens,
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the brain sends extremely weak signals to these internal speech systems.
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AlterEgo has sensors,
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embedded in a thin plastic, flexible and transparent device
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that sits on your neck just like a sticker.
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These sensors pick up on these internal signals
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sourced deep within the mouth cavity,
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right from the surface of the skin.
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An AI program running in the background
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then tries to figure out what the user's trying to say.
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It then feeds back an answer to the user
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by means of bone conduction,
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audio conducted through the skull into the user's inner ear,
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that the user hears,
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overlaid on top of the user's natural hearing of the environment,
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without blocking it.
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The combination of all these parts, the input, the output and the AI,
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gives a net subjective experience of an interface inside your head
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that you could talk to in likeness to talking to yourself.
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Just to be very clear, the device does not record or read your thoughts.
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It records deliberate information that you want to communicate
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through deliberate engagement of your internal speech systems.
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People don't want to be read, they want to write.
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Which is why we designed the system
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to deliberately record from the peripheral nervous system.
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Which is why the control in all situations resides with the user.
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I want to stop here for a second and show you a live demo.
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What I'm going to do is, I'm going to ask Eric a question.
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And he's going to search for that information
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without vocalizing, without typing, without moving his fingers,
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without moving his mouth.
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Simply by internally asking that question.
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The AI will then figure out the answer and feed it back to Eric,
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through audio, through the device.
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While you see a laptop in front of him, he's not using it.
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Everything lives on the device.
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All he needs is that sticker device to interface with the AI and the internet.
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So, Eric, what's the weather in Vancouver like, right now?
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What you see on the screen
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are the words that Eric is speaking to himself right now.
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This is happening in real time.
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Eric: It's 50 degrees and rainy here in Vancouver.
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Arnav Kapur: What happened is that the AI sent the answer
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through audio, through the device, back to Eric.
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What could the implications of something like this be?
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Imagine perfectly memorizing things,
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where you perfectly record information that you silently speak,
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and then hear them later when you want to,
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internally searching for information,
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crunching numbers at speeds computers do,
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silently texting other people.
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Suddenly becoming multilingual,
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so that you internally speak in one language,
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and hear the translation in your head in another.
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The potential could be far-reaching.
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There are millions of people around the world
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who struggle with using natural speech.
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People with conditions such as ALS, or Lou Gehrig's disease,
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stroke and oral cancer,
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amongst many other conditions.
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For them, communicating is a painstakingly slow and tiring process.
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This is Doug.
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Doug was diagnosed with ALS about 12 years ago
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and has since lost the ability to speak.
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Today, he uses an on-screen keyboard
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where he types in individual letters using his head movements.
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And it takes several minutes to communicate a single sentence.
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So we went to Doug and asked him
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what were the first words he'd like to use or say, using our system.
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Perhaps a greeting, like, "Hello, how are you?"
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Or indicate that he needed help with something.
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What Doug said that he wanted to use our system for
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is to reboot the old system he had, because that old system kept on crashing.
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(Laughter)
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We never could have predicted that.
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I'm going to show you a short clip of Doug using our system for the first time.
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(Voice) Reboot computer.
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AK: What you just saw there
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was Doug communicating or speaking in real time for the first time
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since he lost the ability to speak.
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There are millions of people
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who might be able to communicate in real time like Doug,
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with other people, with their friends and with their families.
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My hope is to be able to help them express their thoughts and ideas.
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I believe computing, AI and the internet
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would disappear into us as extensions of our cognition,
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instead of being external entities or adversaries,
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amplifying human ingenuity,
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giving us unimaginable abilities and unlocking our true potential.
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And perhaps even freeing us to becoming better at being human.
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Thank you so much.
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(Applause)
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Shoham Arad: Come over here.
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OK.
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I want to ask you a couple of questions, they're going to clear the stage.
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I feel like this is amazing, it's innovative,
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it's creepy, it's terrifying.
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Can you tell us what I think ...
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I think there are some uncomfortable feelings around this.
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Tell us, is this reading your thoughts,
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will it in five years,
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is there a weaponized version of this, what does it look like?
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AK: So our first design principle, before we started working on this,
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was to not render ethics as an afterthought.
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So we wanted to bake ethics right into the design.
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We flipped the design.
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Instead of reading from the brain directly,
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we're reading from the voluntary nervous system
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that you deliberately have to engage to communicate with the device,
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while still bringing the benefits of a thinking or a thought device.
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The best of both worlds in a way.
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SA: OK, I think people are going to have a lot more questions for you.
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Also, you said that it's a sticker.
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So right now it sits just right here?
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Is that the final iteration,
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what the final design you hope looks like?
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AK: Our goal is for the technology to disappear completely.
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SA: What does that mean?
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AK: If you're wearing it, I shouldn't be able to see it.
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You don't want technology on your face, you want it in the background,
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to augment you in the background.
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So we have a sticker version that conforms to the skin,
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that looks like the skin,
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but we're trying to make an even smaller version
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that would sit right here.
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SA: OK.
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I feel like if anyone has any questions they want to ask Arnav,
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he'll be here all week.
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OK, thank you so much, Arnav.
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AK: Thanks, Shoham.
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