Todo-bot vs. Goal-bot

The Todo-bot

• Does what you tell it to do, compliant with any request
• Takes a list and does them in order
• You set its task in priority order
• Tells you when it’s doing somthing or when it’s stuck
• Maintain itself, when told to do so
• Respects your authority at all times
• Comes with a built-in progress bar
• Needs rewards for each task done

The Goal-bot

• Does not take orders on what to do
• Needs description on how the world will change by its actions
• Can only focus on one goal at a time: can’t process goal lists
• Autonomously seeks tasks towards the goal
• Can’t tell you exactly what it will do, or when it will do it
• Maintains itself if it helps achieve the goal
• Prioritizes own tasks
• There’s no progress bar
• Needs rewards for doing the right thing

Exercise for the reader

• Which bot would you rather hire?
• What would an assembly of each class of bots look like?
• Which bot are you?
• Which bot do you treat your future self as?
• How would you debug either bot?
• How do you measure each bot’s performance?
• How would you incentivize each bot to maximize their performance?
• What’s the internal data structure of each bot?
• Is it possible to combine the positive attributes of both?
• Can they work together effectively?