Latent Problem Modeling: A Pragmatic Form of Artificial Intelligence
Chinese Version: 潜变量问题建模:一种务实的人工智能形式 Why Latent Problem Modeling? Instead of pursuing the broad and often vague ambition of Artificial General Intelligence (AGI)—which aims to emulate the entirety of human cognition—it may be more effective to focus on a more actionable and testable alternative: latent problem modeling. Latent Problem Modeling does not define intelligence as mimicking humans. Rather, it frames intelligence as the capacity to define a problem, understand the structure that defines it, and discover solutions within that structure. It models the latent structure of objectives, inputs, and outputs that together form a problem instance. World modeling can be understood as a particular form of Latent Problem Modeling, in which the "problem" being modeled corresponds to understanding and predicting the structure of an external environment or reality. By centering AI research on problem-solving, this approach enables clearer goals, interpretable reasoning, and appli...