Subjects to study for AI?

[ThatWasFat]

If I want to get into AI, what do you think would be the most useful subject. I can't decide if it's like..evolutionary psychology, or discrete math, or computer science, or what. I know alot of current AI research involves alot of graph theory doesnt it?

Any input would be great, thanks.

 

[Gibsons]

subject of AI was discussed in this thread
thought it doesn't exactly answer your question.

 

[imgod2u]

Depends on which side of AI you want to get into. The two major fields are mainly Computer Science and Psychology (many aspects of it). The later mostly studies what intelligence in its current form (humans) is while the former hopes to emulate/simulate it. Having a small background in AI, I have to say I prefer the former as the later sounds like too much guess-work and no solid results.

 

[BigPoppa]

I'm at Georgia Tech

I'm sorry.

 

[ThatWasFat]

Thank you for your sympathy.

But seriously, damn. There really is no evolutionary psychology major here at Tech. I'm going to have to e-mail some folks.

 

[BigPoppa]

Originally posted by: ThatWasFat
Thank you for your sympathy.

But seriously, damn. There really is no evolutionary psychology major here at Tech. I'm going to have to e-mail some folks.

Email the heads of the College of Computing and the Psychology program. Chances are someone there is researching AI. Lord knows 3/4 of the professors I had didn't give a sh*t about anything but research.

 

[complacent]

I would suggest majoring in some sort of applied mathematics, such as Computer Science. If you are that serious, it would not hurt to take some psychology classes either. Read up on books pertaining to how the brain works. Then, try to emulate the brain with some method. I currently feel that the most promising area of A.I. is in the development and study of neural networks. Good luck!

 

[cquark]

Originally posted by: BigPoppa

Originally posted by: ThatWasFat
Thank you for your sympathy.

But seriously, damn. There really is no evolutionary psychology major here at Tech. I'm going to have to e-mail some folks.

Email the heads of the College of Computing and the Psychology program. Chances are someone there is researching AI. Lord knows 3/4 of the professors I had didn't give a sh*t about anything but research.

They're trained, hired, and retained for research. If you're not a productive researcher, you get kicked out the door when it comes time for tenure. If you're not an effective teacher, there's little consequence.

In large part, it's a result of how universities are funded, with most of the budgets of research universities coming from research grants rather than tuition (MIT gets only about 10% of its budget from tuition, for example.) Even the universities that aren't Research I or II class schools want to gain that status so they can expand their funding opportunities in an era of declining education funding (Ohio, for example, cut higher education 8 times in the last 5 years.)

 

[ThatWasFat]

Yeah that's defenitely why I want to work for GTRI (Georgai Tech Research Institute). I'm sure GTRI is high up there when it comes to research prestige and working for them would be pretty great.