Course Catalog

Description

It is an introductory course in artificial intelligence (AI). The definition of AI is itself rather controversial; but, as a starting point, we may think of AI as the study of how to program computers to behave in ways which, when observed in humans, is usually attributed to "intelligence". The course starts with an attempt to identify exactly what we mean by "intelligence". The history and philosophical foundations of AI are then glossed over. Since most AI problems could be conceptualized as search problems, an intensive study of search algorithms comes next.
Knowledge-based AI systems are complex mutations of the simple search-based systems, with the complexity emerging from the elaborate representations of world states and operators. Logic is the main tool employed in knowledge-based systems; a study of logic and reasoning (mainly resolution) is hence necessary. By thus laying the foundations of AI, a number of topics are then introduced: planning, learning, and reasoning in the presence of uncertainty. All along, an agent-oriented approach is taken to motivate the various topics.