This book is a collection of writings by active researchers in the field
of Artificial General Intelligence, on topics of central importance in
the field. Each chapter focuses on one theoretical problem, proposes a
novel solution, and is written in sufficiently non-technical language to
be understandable by advanced undergraduates or scientists in allied
fields. This book is the very first collection in the field of
Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) focusing on theoretical,
conceptual, and philosophical issues in the creation of thinking
machines. All the authors are researchers actively developing AGI
projects, thus distinguishing the book from much of the theoretical
cognitive science and AI literature, which is generally quite divorced
from practical AGI system building issues. And the discussions are
presented in a way that makes the problems and proposed solutions
understandable to a wide readership of non-specialists, providing a
distinction from the journal and conference-proceedings literature. The
book will benefit AGI researchers and students by giving them a solid
orientation in the conceptual foundations of the field (which is not
currently available anywhere); and it would benefit researchers in
allied fields by giving them a high-level view of the current state of
thinking in the AGI field. Furthermore, by addressing key topics in the
field in a coherent way, the collection as a whole may play an important
role in guiding future research in both theoretical and practical AGI,
and in linking AGI research with work in allied disciplines
