One Powerful Environment and Testbed for Human-Level AGI

Would Be a “Virtual School” in an Open Source Virtual World

Enhanced with Robot Simulation and Bead

Physics

Ben Goertzel & Stephan Vladimir Bugaj

Hypothesis 1: Human-like AGI reflects, in large part, an adaptation to the “everyday world” humans interact with (including social and physical interactions)

Hypothesis 2: A reasonably rich “virtual school” environment can encapsulate the AGI-critical aspects of the everyday world

OpenSim

Croquet

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Current virtual world platforms have some fairly severe limitations, which fortunately can be remedied with effort

Object-object interactions are oversimplified, making tool use difficult

Agent control relies on animations and other simplified mechanisms, rather than having virtual servomotors associated with each joint of an agent’s skeleton

Partial solution: Integration of a robot simulator with a virtual world

engine

Player / Gazebo: 3D robot control + simulation framework

OpenSim, Croquet, etc.: open-source virtual world

It seems feasible to replace OpenSim or Croquet’s physics engine with appropriate components of Player/Gazebo, and make coordinated client & protocol modifications

+

Current Virtual Worlds lack fluids, powders, pastes, fabrics … they don’t completely

implement “naïve physics”

One likely solution: bead physics

Spherical beads with specially designed adhesion properties can emulate fluids, fabrics, pastes, strings, rubber bands, etc.

Bead physics can be added to virtual world physics engines

Virtual School (VIRTUS) Proposal

Create enhanced version of current OSS virtual world to support Virtual School requirements

•Modify server, client for more flexible interaction with physics engine and external software

•Integrate virtual world with Player robot simulator

•Add bead physics to ODE or other physics engine

•Add special Environment Control user interface and server plugin to enable flexible configuration and control of environment

•Make VIRTUS servers open for use by all AI researchers

•AI systems communicate with virtual world proxy via XML

•Multiple AIs and humans may flexibly interact

•Researchers may also run their own VIRTUS servers

•Pre-fab bodies available or researchers may create their own

•Objects may be scripted in-world or controlled by external scripts

Example “Early Preschool Level” VIRTUS Tasks

Task-set name Brief Description Object permanence The AI is exposed to object and individuals, and then they are obscured

from it, and it must answer questions or make judgments based on whether it understands that the entities still exist and have the same properties even when obscured. For instance, a block can be placed behind a room divider, and then a ball rolled behind the divider, and questions can be asked to probe whether the AI understands there is a possibility of the ball hitting the block

Theory of mind (first-order)

The AI is placed in situations where it observes other agents and objects, and it must then ask questions or make judgments based on its understanding of what the other agents know (based on what they have seen). For instance, if the agent observes that Bob has seen where the red ball is hidden but Jim has not, if it’s asked who will find the red ball first, it should answer “Bob.”

Identifying novel objects within familiar categories, based on function

For instance, if the AI sees an agent playing with several objects and is told these objects are called “toys”, then if it sees another agent playing with a different object, it should know that this new object is potentially called a “toy” as well.

Describing functions of objects

After watching human-controlled agents use an object, the AI is asked what each object is used for

Identification of individuals’ emotions based on their actions

For instance, if the AI knows that in many instances when agents have spontaneously danced, they have been labeled “happy”, it should generalize this and infer that spontaneous dancing often indicates happiness.

Understanding arrangements of objects

The AI should be able to answer questions regarding basic prepositional relationships among objects, such as “on top of”, “next to”, “underneath”, “near” and so forth.

Understanding movements of objects

The AI should be able to answer questions regarding basic movement relationships of among objects, such as “toward”, “away from”, “fast”, “slow”, etc.

Obtaining and cleaning up objects

When instructed to obtain or put awayobjects fitting certain descriptions, the agent should be able to do so (this is a very simple case of “following instructions”

Example

“Advanced

Preschool Level”

VIRTUS Tasks

Example

“Elementary

and Middle

School Level”

VIRTUS Tasks

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