# Computer Power Broke AI Away from Mathematical Models by Bart Kosko > “Rising computer power led to the first large break with the math-model approach in various species of artificial intelligence. Computer scientists programmed expert-system search trees directly from words. Some put uncertainty math models on the trees but the tree structure itself used words or text strings. The non-numerical structure let experts directly encode their expertise in verbal rules. That removed the old math models but still left the problem of literally doing only what the expert or modeler said to do. Adaptive fuzzy rule-based systems allowed experts to state rules in words while the fuzzy system itself remained numeric. Data could in principle overcome modeler bias by adapting the rule structure in new directions as the data poured in. That reduced expert or modeler input to little more than giving initial conditions and occasional updates to the inference structure. Still all these AI tree-based knowledge systems suffer from the curse of dimensionality in some form of combinatorial rule explosion.” > **— Bart Kosko**, *2007, Edge Annual Question, “What Are You Optimistic About?”* ## Sources and Context - **Direct Edge response and surrounding essay:** [Electrical Engineer, USC; Author, Noise](https://www.edge.org/response-detail/11857) — Edge published this exact passage in its 2007 Annual Question collection, *WHAT ARE YOU OPTIMISTIC ABOUT?*. The response page preserves the surrounding argument and qualifications. - **Complete local collection index:** [[research/Edge 2007 Full Quotation Curation|Edge 2007 Full Quotation Curation]] — retained source-first record for the complete response cohort and this passage's promotion status. ## Related Articles and Collections - **Collection:** [[collections/Edge|Edge]] - **Collection:** [[collections/Machine Succession|Machine Succession]] - **Article:** [[articles/Modern Artificial Intelligence in the 1970s|AI in the 1970s]] - **Article:** [[articles/Christopher Nolan's Odyssey at the Threshold of Machine Succession|Nolan's Odyssey]] - **Article:** [[articles/Cyber-Physical Lessons from Imperial Beekeeping|Cyber-Physical Beekeeping]] - **Wiki map:** [[wiki/Artificial Intelligence|Artificial Intelligence]] ## Related Topics - [[wiki/Artificial Intelligence|Artificial Intelligence]] - [[wiki/Coevolution|Coevolution]] - [[wiki/Evolutionary Dynamics|Evolutionary Dynamics]] - [[wiki/Evolvability|Evolvability]] ## Share on Social Media ``` “Rising computer power led to the first large break with the math-model approach in various species of artificial intelligence. Computer scientists programmed expert-system search trees directly from words. Some put uncertainty math models on the trees but the tree structure itself used words or text strings. The non-numerical structure let experts directly encode their expertise in verbal rules. That removed the old math models but still left the problem of literally doing only what the expert or modeler said to do. Adaptive fuzzy rule-based systems allowed experts to state rules in words while the fuzzy system itself remained numeric. Data could in principle overcome modeler bias by adapting the rule structure in new directions as the data poured in. That reduced expert or modeler input to little more than giving initial conditions and occasional updates to the inference structure. Still all these AI tree-based knowledge systems suffer from the curse of dimensionality in some form of combinatorial rule explosion.” — Bart Kosko, 2007, Edge Annual Question, “What Are You Optimistic About?” https://bryantmcgill.com/simple-reminders-bart-kosko-computer-power-broke-ai-away ```