Mother Alexa

In your article on the capabilities of AI and Alexa (November, p43), you talked about how smart technology not only responds to human commands but is also ‘predictive’ and ‘proactive’ in its actions.

As humans are naturally unpredictable beings, is it really possible for an AI system to calculate all possible circumstances and carry out the correct actions?

You wrote that the system can develop and adapt – like when a baby is crying, Alexa turns on the light. What if the baby is crying because it is hungry? A parent can develop an acute knowledge of the different sounds a baby makes and what they mean, often instinctively. Would it really be possible for an AI system to memorise each individual crying noise and determine what each one means? Tom Piccolo