Quo Vadis, AI?

I am not terribly interested in whether computers can think or become conscious. I am interested in whether they can amplify our thinking, in a way analogous to the way machines have amplified our muscles.

Chatbots are the hot topic now. IBM, Microsoft and Google are racing to develop them.

I make one assumption that seem undeniable. They are being developed to make money. Philosophical issues are beside the point.

Microsoft and Google are developing them as adjuncts to their search engines. The lesson of Alta Vista vs Google has not been lost. The company that controls search reaps megabucks. I assume IBM planning to market them as expert systems, in medicine, for example.

So my question is not, can they think, but rather, can they reason. Can they be trusted reliably to draw conclusions from unfiltered and undigested input.

Current chatbots are prototypes. They are being torture tested by people deliberately trying to trip them up. Consider the following:

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