As you say, it’s more of a continuum than a binary. A self-driving car is more agenty than Google Maps, and a self-driving car that was making independent choices of where to drive would be more agentic still.
People are generally trying to make all kinds of more agentic AIs, because more agentic AIs are so much more useful.
Stock-trading bots that automatically buy and sell stock are more agenty than software that just tells human traders what to buy, and preferred because a bot without a human in the loop can outcompete a slower system that does have the slow human making decisions.
An AI autonomously optimizing data center cooling is more agenty than one that just tells human operators where to make adjustments and is preferred… that article doesn’t actually make it explicit why they switched to an autonomously operating system, but “because it can make lots of small tweaks humans wouldn’t bother with and is therefore more effective” seems to be implied?
The military has expressed an interest in making their drones more autonomous (agenty) rather than being remotely operated. This is for several reasons, including the fact that remote-operated drones can be jammed, and because having a human in the loop slows down response time if fighting against an enemy drone.
All kinds of personal assistant software that anticipates your needs and actively tries to help you is more agenty than software that just passively waits for you to use it. E.g. once when I was visiting a friend my phone popped up a notification about the last bus home departing soon. Some people want their phones to be more agentic like this because it’s convenient if you have someone actively anticipating your needs and ensuring that they get taken care of for you.
As you say, it’s more of a continuum than a binary. A self-driving car is more agenty than Google Maps, and a self-driving car that was making independent choices of where to drive would be more agentic still.
People are generally trying to make all kinds of more agentic AIs, because more agentic AIs are so much more useful.
Stock-trading bots that automatically buy and sell stock are more agenty than software that just tells human traders what to buy, and preferred because a bot without a human in the loop can outcompete a slower system that does have the slow human making decisions.
An AI autonomously optimizing data center cooling is more agenty than one that just tells human operators where to make adjustments and is preferred… that article doesn’t actually make it explicit why they switched to an autonomously operating system, but “because it can make lots of small tweaks humans wouldn’t bother with and is therefore more effective” seems to be implied?
The military has expressed an interest in making their drones more autonomous (agenty) rather than being remotely operated. This is for several reasons, including the fact that remote-operated drones can be jammed, and because having a human in the loop slows down response time if fighting against an enemy drone.
All kinds of personal assistant software that anticipates your needs and actively tries to help you is more agenty than software that just passively waits for you to use it. E.g. once when I was visiting a friend my phone popped up a notification about the last bus home departing soon. Some people want their phones to be more agentic like this because it’s convenient if you have someone actively anticipating your needs and ensuring that they get taken care of for you.