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Artificial Intelligence (AI) is described as a branch of computer science that focuses on the development of machines to be able to perform tasks that usually require human intelligence.
Published in 1950, "Computing Machinery and Intelligence" by Alan Turing opens with the line: “I propose to consider the question, ‘Can machines think?'” In this paper, Turing proposes a test of a machine’s ability to display intelligent behaviors equal to or indistinguishable from that of a human being. This is now known as the Turing Test. A great example of such a test can be seen in the movie Ex Machina.
The term ‘artificial intelligence’ was first coined by John McCarthy, one of the organizers of a conference held at Dartmouth College in 1956. McCarthy has since come to be known as one of the founding fathers of AI. The proposal for the conference included the following claim: every aspect of learning or any other feature of intelligence can be so precisely described that a machine can be made to simulate it. This conference is where AI, as a field of study, began.
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