The Real AI Institute is a nonprofit organization, dedicated to the creation of the real AI and its dissemination and development for the benefit of all living beings.

What do we mean by " real" AI?

Not just software that displays intelligent behavior in one particular domain like chess or financial prediction.  This kind of software is fascinating, but it doesn't meet our criteria of intelligence.  

Our goal is a generally, flexibly intelligent software system.  One with a sense of its own self and its own digital embodiment in the world, with its own goals, feelings and motivations.  One that learns experientially based on its interactions with humans and other computer programs.

No such software program exists.  Our goal at the Real AI Institute is to create one, and allow it to interact freely with Internet-using humans like yourself.  

One might think there currently existed similar R&D projects within major corporate research labs, or big-name academic institutions.  One would be wrong.  By all appearances, we are the only group in the world currently pushing hard toward a fully-functional, autonomous digital intelligence, based on a detailed design describing how all the aspects of intelligence can be realized in software in an integrated way.  

At first our digital mind will be a baby, but it will learn through interacting with us, and even in the beginning it will have some valuable insights, due to its different way of thinking.  We will feed it many kinds of information, and see which types are more agreeable to its evolving mind.  So far we've been playing with financial and biological data, and text describing this data.  Already our system's various components demonstrate formidable abilities.

The Real AI Institute is a new organization, but the project it embodies is not new -- the Real AI Institute team has been together for 3 years, within the AI Development and Research Divisions of Webmind Inc. (originally named Intelligenesis Corp.).   When Webmind Inc. dissolved on April 1, 2001, the consensus among the firm's core AI scientists and engineers was clear: we had come too close to the end goal to give up the quest, company or no company.  A group of us resolved to keep the real AI aspect of Webmind Inc.'s work alive -- and thus the Real AI Institute was born.  Webmind Inc.'s AI staff numbered 45 at maximum; the Real AI Institute diehards number less than half that.  But what we lack in numbers, we make up in confidence, dedication, insight and sweat.

Within Webmind Inc. we produced 750,000 lines of Java code embodying a first attempt at a real AI system, the Webmind AI Engine.  We got perhaps 3/4 of the way toward the end goal of a real AI system, but we found ourselves bogged down in the kind of technical problems that confront many large software projects.  Now, taking everything we learned from this experience, we are starting over, and building a leaner, meaner real AI, in a combination of C and Java.  After 2 months of effort, we have replicated about 1/3 of the core AI portions of the Webmind AI Engine, in many fewer lines of code and using a vastly more efficient software architecture.  Since Webmind Inc. is no more, the name "Webmind" is free, and we now call our real AI system simply Webmind, as was done with prototype versions of the system in 1996 before Intelligenesis Corp. was formed.  Webmind Inc. is gone, but Webmind is cruising along nicely.

By the end of March 2002, we believe, we will be able to launch on this website a baby digital mind, our first baby Webmind.  Only one thing can stop us: we all need to eat, and some of us have families to feed as well.  This is why, as mentioned above (we never claimed to be subtle!), the Real AI Institute is seeking donations.  We need these badly.  We hope to raise $500,000 by the end of August, 2001.  

This initial $500,000 will cover living expenses for a year, for the minimum core team needed to get the job done: 2 scientists based in the US (Ben Goertzel and Pei Wang), and 12 software engineers and AI scientists based in Belo Horizonte, Brazil (where the largest Webmind Inc. office was located).  Of course, a bigger team than this would be wonderful, if donations exceed our expectations.  And if donations fall short, well, a team of 3 would be better than a team of 0.  But we believe that a team of 15 or so is about the minimum needed for smooth progress toward our goal.  We will initiate another fundraising round toward the beginning of 2002, aimed at raising funds to support us through early 2003. 

We don't believe that real AI should be owned by any commercial organization.  But this is not to say it shouldn't be commercialized.  To fund our work, in addition to seeking donations,  we are interested in developing co-development relationships with commercial firms operating in particular market niches.  However, we caution that the commercial applications of a real AI should not be confused with the essence of the thing.  An AI, just like a person, can work for a corporation and make money for itself and for the corporation.  But a person is not his job and a real AI is not its commercial application.  The Real AI Institute exists to do what no profit-focused organization can do: focus on bringing real AI to the world at large, in the service of everyone, rather than in the service of the shareholders of some particular corporation.

Although we believe we have our project well under control, we are always eager for engineering, design or conceptual assistance from relevantly skilled and knowledgeable individuals.  If you're a computer science, mathematics or cognitive science expert and are interested in devoting some of your spare time to helping us create real AI, please click here.

Finally, as our schedules permit, we will publish more and more of the concepts underlying our work.  For now, a brief summary of some of our work, focusing on our long-term goals but also touching on some nitty-gritty software architecture and AI theory issues, can be found in the article Webmind: A Digital Intelligence in the Making.