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WhoIsLExAu

last edited 2 years ago by jeroen

Who is LExAu?

At present, LExAu is a one man project. I, Jeroen van Maanen, started it in 2003 as the next step in realizing an idea that occurred to me in 1995. That idea was:

Learning can be a goal in itself that surpasses and contains all subgoals that a system can have with respect to its environment

I have been fascinated with Artificial Intelligence (AI) since I read Gödel, Escher, Bach in 1986 (more than six year after its publication). However, I felt that AI tried to jump to the top of the stairs. Gradually I began to see that the mystery of intelligence is not as much the ability to solve problems, but the ability to create them. So I began to think about how an artificial system could get an inner sense of purpose.

Why the fascination with the artificial? Well, that is a rather personal story. During puberty, children normally learn to integrate their personal likings and feelings that they develop in early childhood with the knowledge and abilities that they learn in secondary school into an autonomous person with a personal sense of direction. In that period I had a traumatic experience. A trusted adult misused that trust to achieve his own ends. I adapted to this experience by seeking approval. I developed a tendency to try and meet external criteria. In that respect I treated myself as an automaton. Of course I ran into trouble when I wanted to take part in relationships that were based on equality. Therefore I became interested in the question:

How do you extend an automaton to become a full person (again)?

During my time as a graduate student in the field of Computational Learning Theory at CWI I got the idea that is central to LExAu, but it was too early for me to create problems that could lead to a first step in realizing this idea.

A few years later, I began to accept help. As a part of my therapy I discovered that the idea that I had as a graduate student embodies a real principle that is central to autonomous individuals: follow your inner purpose.

Now the path takes a turn. I no longer need the physical proof that an automaton can be autonomous to generate hope for myself. However, though my personal experience, that cost me a lot, I hit upon this precious principle. I have just read The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People and I can see that it makes sense to put this idea into serving the purposes of as many people as possible, with the added benefit for me that I can devote my time to something that is really close to my heart. So question is now:

How can other people benefit from the LExAu project or the Autonomous Learning principle?

Some ideas:

• I would be happy to help write (even co-author) papers on the theoretical aspects of the Autonomous Learning principle
• Use the LExAu software to explore complex environments where no well-defined utility functions exist (yet), for example,
  • Bioinformatics
  • Space exploration
  • Industrial control where control strategies influence the nature of the utility function
  • Theory of games where the sum of the gains of the players need not be zero
• Use the LExAu software in simulation software to model autonomous agents
• Use the LExAu software in software games to model computer controlled players or 'bots.
• Extend the LExAu software to create interactive control systems for artificial limbs, integrating with nerve tissue of the wearer
  • (long term) These interactive systems that replace nerve tissue could replace damaged brain tissue
    • (really really long term) An external artificial learning system based on LExAu could be intergrated so closely with a human brain that over time it would become one big system of interdependent components where the artificial part would continue to be the same person when the biological part deteriorates: a vehicle for the mind (see also BigHairyAudaciousGoal)

Interested? Contact me using the contact form.

JeroenVanMaanen