Minecraft is already being used as an educational tool at schools around the world but now the hugely successful game isn’t just teaching kids, it’s teaching artificial intelligence.
Computer scientists at Microsoft’s research labs have started using Minecraft as a tool for teaching artificial intelligence as part of the recently announced Project AIX initiative.
The AIX platform places an emphasis on not programming AI to perform specific tasks. Instead, the goal is to allow AI to perform tasks organically. Microsoft detailed the project in a new blog post and gave the examples of an AI player attempting to climb to the highest point on the map.
In the same way that an inexperienced human player would read the surrounding environment and determine where they can go and where they can’t, the AI calculates the feasible routes to the top of the map. It also dies in lava – a lot.
The game’s open-ended world is said to be well-suited for AI research as it offers an unstructured environment in which to develop and learn. Minecraft’s varied activities also encourage the AI to learn as it attempts new things.
Project AIX is currently restricted to a private beta test for select academic researchers but Microsoft plans to roll it out as an open-source license later this year.
Microsoft purchased Minecraft, and its developer Mojang, for $2.5 billion two years ago. Since then, the company has been experimenting with various alternative applications for the game, including a HoleLens AR version.
While it’s early days yet, I would like to say that I, for one, welcome our new AI overlords.