Comment by ssivark

This kind of over-indexing to statistical correlations in past data, without understanding the casual mechanism is a common criticism of contemporary AI techniques, especially "deep" RL ;-)

Maybe as someone who hasn't been steeped in AI for the past several decades, I'm not able to appreciate the depth of emotion behind Sutton's statements. I find this kind of vague pontificating to be boring. It seems aimed more at convincing the author of a position, than doing a critical analysis and convincing the reader.

Will compute+data solve AI? Will structured algorithms solve AI? Will neuroscience provide key breakthroughs? Who knows? We'll find out when we find out. This article provides little value beyond historical reminiscing.

In the meanwhile, there are many interesting problems begging for attention where data or compute is limited.

I'll believe it when these techniques can solve real problems in a robust way. More importantly, when it can solve real problems in a robust way, opinions don't matter! Proponents won't need to go around trying to convince people almost in the manner of superstitions belief.