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Joon Sung Park Smallville AI agent human behaviour experiment

Imagine a world where artificial intelligence can mimic human behavior so closely that it’s hard to tell the difference between a virtual character and a real person. This is no longer the stuff of science fiction. A team of researchers, including Joon Sung Park, has made a significant stride in the realm of AI with the creation of a virtual environment known as Smallville. This project is a collaborative effort between Stanford, Google Research, and Google DeepMind, and it’s changing the way we think about AI’s capabilities.

A new way of simulating human behavior called “generative agents.” Like in the video game “The Sims,” these agents — trained on AI to develop a stream of memories — notice each other, initiate conversations, form opinions and plan ahead. Park shows how these simulacra could open up new opportunities to study human behavior and test out things like social policies.

Smallville AI Village

Smallville is not your average AI system. Here, AI-driven agents are doing something extraordinary: they’re performing complex tasks, engaging in social interactions, and even organizing events without any pre-written scripts. This is a big deal because, until now, AI has relied heavily on specific instructions from programmers to function. But in Smallville, these agents are making decisions and creating memories just like humans do.

Smallville AI human simulation experiment

The secret to their human-like behavior lies in a new kind of architecture that combines language models with decision-making processes. As these agents move through Smallville, they describe their observations in natural language, much like a person might recount their day. These descriptions become their memories, which they use to inform their future actions. This allows them to do things like throw a party for Valentine’s Day without any human intervention. Watch a replay of the simulation here.

AI agents simulating human behavior

When tested, these AI agents showed behavior that was more natural and human-like than both traditional AI models and human actors. This is a huge leap forward in our quest to create digital beings that can accurately reflect human behavior. The potential applications for this technology are vast and thrilling. For instance, in the world of video games, characters could become more complex and interact with players in ways that are currently unimaginable.

Here are some other articles you may find of interest on the subject of building AI agents and using them for automation and more :

Beyond gaming, this technology could also be used to model societal changes and provide insights into human social structures. It’s a tool that could help us understand how societies evolve and function, which has implications for fields as diverse as sociology, economics, and urban planning. Below is the introduction to the paper and more explanation on how and why the simulation was created.

Generative Agents: Interactive Simulacra of Human Behavior

“Believable proxies of human behavior can empower interactive applications ranging from immersive environments to rehearsal spaces for interpersonal communication to prototyping tools. In this paper, we introduce generative agents–computational software agents that simulate believable human behavior. Generative agents wake up, cook breakfast, and head to work; artists paint, while authors write; they form opinions, notice each other, and initiate conversations; they remember and reflect on days past as they plan the next day.

To enable generative agents, we describe an architecture that extends a large language model to store a complete record of the agent’s experiences using natural language, synthesize those memories over time into higher-level reflections, and retrieve them dynamically to plan behavior. We instantiate generative agents to populate an interactive sandbox environment inspired by The Sims, where end users can interact with a small town of twenty five agents using natural language.

In an evaluation, these generative agents produce believable individual and emergent social behaviors: for example, starting with only a single user-specified notion that one agent wants to throw a Valentine’s Day party, the agents autonomously spread invitations to the party over the next two days, make new acquaintances, ask each other out on dates to the party, and coordinate to show up for the party together at the right time.

We demonstrate through ablation that the components of our agent architecture–observation, planning, and reflection–each contribute critically to the believability of agent behavior. By fusing large language models with computational, interactive agents, this work introduces architectural and interaction patterns for enabling believable simulations of human behavior.” Read the full paper here.

AI simulates human behavior

One of the most exciting aspects of this project is that it’s open-source. This means that anyone with an interest in AI can dive into Smallville and experiment with the simulation. This open approach is crucial for the advancement of AI technology because it allows researchers from all over the world to contribute to and learn from the project.

The creation of these generative agents in Smallville represents a major milestone in the quest to replicate human reality in a digital space. With their advanced capabilities, these AI agents are setting a new standard for what’s possible in virtual environments. The collaboration between leading research institutions and the decision to make the project open-source are indicative of a new, collaborative era in AI research. This is not just about creating more realistic video game characters; it’s about understanding the essence of human behavior and translating that understanding into the digital realm.

As we look to the future, the possibilities are as limitless as our imagination. Smallville is just the beginning. With continued research and collaboration, we’re on the cusp of developing AI that can not only replicate human behavior but also offer new insights into the very nature of intelligence and consciousness. This is a thrilling time for AI research, and the journey has only just begun. To learn more about Smallville jump over to the original TED Talk hosted by Joon Sung Park.

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France has been forced to close its canals and rivers because human traffickers use them as “taxi boats” to transport migrants over the English Channel.

The French government has begun mooring buoys across rivers to prevent smuggling gangs from eluding French police and border guards on the beaches.

Criminal groups have been transporting empty “taxi boats” down rivers, streams, and canals to the sea and sailing them around the northern French coast to meet migrants at established meeting spots to ferry people across the Channel.

The French government’s reluctance to interfere once the boats have set sail has been exploited by proponents of the technique, who believe that doing so may imperil lives. The French have been unwilling to assist since the migrants must wade into the Mediterranean to board the “taxi boats.”

Instead, the French have used a network of buoys to build a floating barrier in the estuaries of rivers such as the Authie and Canche, which flow into the English Channel from up to 40 miles south of Calais.

The frequency of successful Channel crossings by small boats is said to have decreased by 22% this year as a result of the tactic and increased shore patrols.

Since Rishi Sunak signed a three-year, £478 million deal with French President Emanuel Macron in March to stop the crossings, the number of officers on foot or in buggies on French beaches has more than doubled, reaching over 800 every night.

When human traffickers began using the “taxi boat” approach last autumn, the immigration minister, Robert Jenrick, is alleged to have pressured the French to limit the rivers and canals.

“When we did this in another location, it had a significant impact and is pushing smugglers south west, which is less easy terrain for them, which partly explains the consistently lower numbers,” a source added.

To bypass the French police’s main strategy of punching boats with knives to keep them from leaving the shore, “taxi boats” from the sea have also been employed.

Surveillance equipment has been installed in 12 communities and four ports along a 100-mile stretch of northern France’s coast, with more to follow in 2024.

Frontex, the European Union’s border agency, assists the French police by conducting patrols in the region using infrared and thermal cameras equipped planes and drones.

However, once the boats are at sea, the French have a policy of not interfering unless a dinghy is in trouble and the migrants are deemed to be likely to collaborate, something the traffickers are well aware of.

Observing ships in action

British lawmakers have urged the French to follow Belgium’s lead, which has reduced the number of border crossings by 90% to less than 1,000.

The joint UK-According to top Border Force officials, French patrols with the potential to turn back boats at sea in French waters would render the crossings unviable and shatter the business model of people traffickers.

Officials, on the other hand, have approved of the obstruction strategy. According to a Home Office source, the yearly decline in the number of illegal border crossings by migrants is 22%, despite significant increases elsewhere in Europe.

The “agile deployment of smart barriers and infrastructure,” such as that recently erected on canals, which disrupts people smugglers and pulls them away from their preferred routes, has been linked in part to a fall in the number of boats successfully leaving French territory.

This year, 509 vessels carried about 24,000 refugees and migrants across the English Channel. Smugglers’ earnings have grown as boat capacity has increased, with boats now carrying between fifty and seventy migrants. With just 8,410 in 2020, the number increased to 45,755 in 2022, a record-breaking growth.

This year’s 22% decline can also be attributed to a 90% fall in the number of Albanian migrants crossing the Channel as a result of the government’s agreement with Albania on a fast-track deportation accord. Ministers anticipate a similar reaction if the government’s plans to deport Rwandans are supported by the Supreme Court this fall.