Building a Hybrid Society of Mind Using Components from Ten Different Authors

Building large complex minds is difficult because we do not understand what the necessary components are or how they should interact. Even if the components were known it is difficult to see a situation where a single lab would have all the necessary expertise and manpower to be able to build the mind. One possible answer is to distribute the various components of the mind throughout the Internet, by letting different groups or individuals build parts of the mind. What would be needed then is a protocol that can be used to allow the components to interact, and a mechanism for managing the independent failure of components, and the switching between the required parts of the mind. This paper describes the first attempt to build such a mind. Using components that were developed independently by ten different authors, we have built a mind to solve a specific problem. Although the problem is a simple blocks world implementation, the issues dealt with, as well as the technology used, are relevant for larger and more complex minds. Robust minds require duplication and distribution. The Internet provides the ideal way to build in just such features into artificial minds.