What is the "smartest" demonstration application (i.e. java applet,
chat bot..) of artificial intelligence. is there some sort of open
source A.I. on the net?

Hi macabee,


Good day and thanks for your question.

The best AI on the web is ALICE (Artificial Linguistic Internet
Computer Entity), which is a natural language interface to a
telerobotic eye.

ALICE is written in a language called AIML (Artificial Intelligence
Markup Language), under development so that ALICE can be modified for
the "personalities" of other people besides its present author.

ALICE can be found at http://alicebot.org - click on "Talk to
A.L.I.C.E"
If you have no one to chat with, ALICE is there :)

Another chatbot on the lines of ALICE is ELIZA, found at
http://www-ai.ijs.si/eliza/eliza.html

One particular site which I came across while researching on this
answer was http://q.20q.net/q.cgi This site simply amazed me. I
thought of "girlfriend", and it guess it correctly within 22 tries.

There are a few directories on chatbots and AI demostrations :

Yahoo! Directory Web Games > Artificial Intelligence
http://dir.yahoo.com/Recreation/Games/Computer_Games/Internet_Games/Web_Games/Artificial_Intelligence/

Google Directory on Chatterbots
http://directory.google.com/Top/Computers/Artificial_Intelligence/Natural_Language/Chatterbots/

Google directory on AI
http://directory.google.com/Top/Computers/Artificial_Intelligence/

BotSpot : ChatBots
http://www.botspot.com/search/s-chat.htm


As far as your question on Open Source AI is concerned, the best place
for that is :

OpenAI - Open Source Artificial Intelligence
http://openai.net
OpenAI is an open source artificial intelligence (AI) project that
aims to create specifications for common components (Neural Networks,
Genetic Algorithms etc.. )


I hope this answers your question. If you have any clarifications,
then please don't hesitate to ask.

Warm regards,
aditya2k

Search terms : AI chat, AI open source

Informative answer. I came across the ALICE and ELIZA bots myself by
doing searches, but the other information is also very good.

Last I heard, technology still has a long ways to go before we have
true AI, but there are some impressive demonstrations. Don't mortgage
your house to buy their stock.  Neil

Hi,
The above information about ALICE being the best out there is based on
last years AI contest. However, this year, in that same contest, ALICE
has been "demoted" down to seventh. The top three are "Ella",
"TalkBot" and "God Louise". You can find this info on the Loebner
Prize 2002 homepage: http://www.loebner-atlanta.org/. According to a
different, but also highly regarded contest Chtterbot Chellenge
(http://www.chatterboxchallenge.com/) the top three are "TalkBot",
"ALICE" and "Jabberwock".

As for open sourse code, a very good place to start is
http://pin-outs.com/directory/Artificial_Intelligence/.

Two more that display fairly high intelligence are available at
http://www.a-i.com.  Alan, the "gatekeeper" of their website, is quite
smart but cannot learn from you as you talk to him.  HAL, on the other
hand, allows you to save your own personality and train it as a sort
of online child.

In order to talk to HAL, you must ask Alan to let you speak to him.