From: Ben Goertzel

From: Ben Goertzel To: Jeffrey Epstein [email protected]> Subject: video chat? Date: Tue, 19 Nov 2013 04:35:07 +0000 Hi, One more small thing.. Joscha mentioned he talked to you via video-chat, by the way.... We've never tried that, but now that I'm in Hong Kong most of the time, it might be a good idea, since a F2F meeting may be difficult to coordinate... Let me know if you have time -- certainly it's "higher bandwidth" in some ways than email. Yours Ben On Sun, Nov 17, 2013 at 2:12 PM, Ben Goertzel <Milla- wrote: > Hi Jeffrey, > [Sony for the semi-long email but there's lots to cover; I know > you're busy and your time is appreciated... ;) ] > Firstly -- Wow, it seems your publicity folks have been quite > impactful lately! Since your team has issued a number of press > releases mentioning me lately, I keep getting emails from people > congratulating me on my new AGI funding windfall from the Jeffrey > Epstein IV Foundation. (Though of course, I have to disappoint them > by telling them that, while you've been consistently and wonderfully > helpful to my work over the years, there has been no big-time > Epstein/OpenCog AGI funding event... yet ...) > Anyway -- on to immediate practical matters — the time of year has > come for me to email you and inquire about the possibility of ongoing > research funding... > You may recall that my Hong Kong government research grant requires > private donations amounting to 10% of the $$, and then the government > will put up 90%. > Last year you donated $20K toward this grant, which was very much appreciated. > This year I have gotten approval for an increase in the Hong Kong > government funding (technically: a separate grant running 2014-2015, > overlapping with the current grant which runs 2013-2014). With the EFTA00675338 > increased funding, next year we will have 10 programmers working on > OpenCog here in Hong Kong, which will be quite exciting. > The 10% payment for the two grants will be $45K in total, due by the > end of 2013. If you could help with this, as you did last year, that > would be fantastic. (Elsewise, to be quite frank, I have no ready way > to come up with that amount of money except to liquidate my minimal > pension fund from my university days ;p ) > The new grant (2014-2015) is specifically for natural language > dialogue, whereas the previous one (2013-2014) was aimed at robotics, > and the earlier one (2012-2013) was aimed at game characters. As you > see, what they like to fund is something that sounds "applied", rather > than core AGI research. However, the bulk of the $$ has always > actually been spent on core AGI research. [The funding agency is > ultimately fine with whatever you do, so long as it's in the vicinity > of the proposal and you publish some papers.] > This brief wiki page > http://wiki.opencog.org/w/OpenCog_HK_2014_High_Level_Goals > summarizes what we've done in the last year (2013 so far), and what is > planned for this fall and the next year. I'm happy to elaborate more > details for you if you wish. It's exciting stuff... with this > increased grant funding, we should be able to finally make an honest > effort at implementing a non-trivial subset of OpenCog... [I can also > send you the full grant proposals if you wish, though they are > somewhat a mix of science-ese and proposal-ese as is usual in such > cases...] > Ah, and btw -- my in-depth book on how to build an AGI ("Engineering > General Intelligence") is being published early next year, in two > volumes, FINALLY ... > http://www.amazon.com/Engineering-General-Intelligence-Part-Cognitive/dp/9462390266/ref=sr_1_3? s=books&ie=UTF8&qid= 1384664281&sr=1-38rkeywords=goertzel+engineering-Fgeneral+intelligence > http://www.amazon.corn/Engineering-General-Intelligence-Part-Architecture/dp/9462390290/ref=sr_1_4? s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1384664311&sr=1-4&keywords=goertzel+engineering-Fgeneral-Fintelligence > I will send you copies when they are available... ;) > Finally -- while your help with the next 10% payment will be VERY much > appreciated, it remains the case that our progress toward AGI would be > accelerated dramatically with additional funding from a visionary such > as yourself. The HK government money is very welcome yet has some > strings attached -- basically you can only use it to hire "postdoc" / > "research associate" type people, not experienced professionals. I > can't use the money to pay myself, nor to pay someone with a decade or > two of professional Al programming experience, nor experienced Al > researchers for that matter. > If you were able to provide a higher level of help, this could of EFTA00675339 > course dramatically accelerate our progress toward AGI. > In this spirit, I have been thinking of putting together a proposal > for a cross-university collaboration on AGI, including adding a few > senior staff to my own team at Hong Kong Poly U, some funds for Joscha > and a couple assistants to work on the motivation/action-selection > aspects, and for Itamar to hire some assistants to work on perception > and action at UTK. If you would be interested to consider such a > proposal, in the vicinity of say US$7501Uyear for 3 years (with > clearly defined interim milestones along the way), let me know. This > level of course is not "AGI Brooklyn Project" scale, but it would > still provide a very major boost to our AGI efforts. > Next, a slightly more personal update.... Right now I am spending half > my time on OpenCog and half on Aidyia, our AI-based proto-hedge fund. > The hedge fund project is going OK; we've been doing lots of research > and software development on machine learning applied to financial > markets, and expect to start trading perhaps Q2 of next year. I have > some equity in Aidyia, so if it succeeds, I'll get a bunch of money at > some point in N years. However, I am very bored with financial market > analysis and eager to spend more of my time on AGI, especially with > this additional OpenCog grant money. During 2014 I plan to segue into > spending more and more time on OpenCog and the quest for AGI, which > is what I really love, while continuing to help Aidyia with high-level > AI advisement... > Assuming the fund project goes OK and we launch the fund in mid-2014 > as expected, I will contact you about possible interest in putting AUM > into the fund. > A 48 minute documentary was made about my and Hugo de Garis's > AUrobotics work in Xiamen in 2009, by the way. It's not terribly > meaty science-wise, but, toward the end are some *great* conversations > with a robot chat system that Ruiting (now my wife) and I built.... > See http://singularityorbust.com if you have an hour to spare watching > it. Beware it contains a lot of me mumbling about philosophy -- but > still, although it's somehat avant-garde in style, it did win a Best > Documentary award at a film festival... > Thanks for reading all the way to the bottom of this long email, and > for your ongoing, very much valued assistance! > By the way, when do you plan to visit Hong Kong? ;) > Yours, > Ben > P.S. > Ah -- also -- I will be on the US East Coast briefly over the holidays > to visit my family... I'm guessing you're traveling during the holidays > too, but if you happen to have a free couple hours on Dec 30 for > example, I could journey from Delaware (where my mom lives) up to New > York or down to Florida to confer with you... EFTA00675340 > Or of course, I am happy to talk on the phone at any time! ... the time > zones are a bit tricky, but for you I'll get up in the middle of the > night or whatever... > > -- > Ben Goertzel, PhD > http://goertzel.org > > "My humanity is a constant self-overcoming" -- Friedrich Nietzsche Ben Goertzel, PhD http://goertzel.org "My humanity is a constant self-overcoming" -- Friedrich Nietzsche EFTA00675341