Artificial intelligence (AI), sometimes called machine intelligence, is intelligence demonstrated by machines, in contrast to the natural intelligencedisplayed by humans and other animals. In computer science AI research is defined as the study of "intelligent agents": any device that perceives its environment and takes actions that maximize its chance of successfully achieving its goals.[1]Colloquially, the term "artificial intelligence" is applied when a machine mimics "cognitive" functions that humans associate with other human minds, such as "learning" and "problem solving".[2]

The scope of AI is disputed: as machines become increasingly capable, tasks considered as requiring "intelligence" are often removed from the definition, a phenomenon known as the AI effect, leading to the quip in Tesler's Theorem, "AI is whatever hasn't been done yet."[3] For instance, optical character recognition is frequently excluded from "artificial intelligence", having become a routine technology.[4]Modern machine capabilities generally classified as AI include successfully understanding human speech,[5] competing at the highest level in strategic game systems (such as chess and Go),[6]autonomously operating cars, and intelligent routing in content delivery networks and military simulations.