When I was a kid, I begged my parents to buy me a red, plastic electronic toy called Merlin.
Billed as "The Electronic Wizard," Merlin was pretty advanced technology for the late 1970s.
It played several games like tic-tac-toe, functioned as a musical instrument and could be considered one of the first electronic synthesizers.
But even at my young age, it didn't take me that long to be able to best the device's electronic "brain" at tic-tac-toe.
Far from being artificially intelligent, Merlin had simply been programmed with every move possible for tic-tac-toe, and just made the move most likely to lead to a victory, depending on your last move.
After playing against Merlin a few times, I began to notice patterns in the way it played, making it easier to anticipate its next moves, allowing me to win every time.
OK, maybe beating a 40-year-old electronic game at tic-tac-toe isn't something I should highlight on my resumé, but I was pretty proud at the time to be able to beat a "computer."
Not long after, I learned to play chess and my parents bought me an electronic chess game, which - similar to the way Merlin worked - was programmed with every chess move possible.
It kicked my butt most every game.
In my defence, chess is a lot more complicated than tic-tac-toe, and I was starting to watch TV shows like Knight Rider and the A-Team, so my IQ was likely being adversely affected.
Still, these early computer chess games couldn't beat a real chess grand master, and it wasn't until 1996 that one finally did beat reigning champ Gary Kasparov.
But even the smartest chess program doesn't learn or think in the same abstract way a human can.
But we are getting close - sort of.
Last week, a computer built by IBM called Watson was put up against two big-brained Jeopardy champions - and won!
What makes this a bit more impressive than when the Chessmaster 2000 makes me look like I'm playing checkers instead of chess, is that game show Jeopardy gives contestants convoluted, pun- and word-play-laden answers to which they must then supply the correct "question."
So, since it appeared Watson was able to essentially "think" and compete with the human brain in a popular intellectual game show, everyone has been talking about how artificial intelligence (AI) is finally here.
But it's not.
Sorry.
Watson, like Merlin and the Chessmaster 2000, can't, in fact, actually think or understand in the way a human can.
Like those older computer brains, Watson is just jammed with information. Except instead of tic-tac-toe or chess moves, it's packed with the equivalent of thousands of encyclopedias on every topic. Mathematical algorithms then scan its database for the answer that is most statistically bound to be correct.
It may be able to answer a factual question about the actors in the A-Team or Knight Rider TV shows, but it wouldn't be able to explain why we all watched them every week.
Its ability to comprehend complex questions and provide simple accurate answers, however, will likely be put to use in future for commercial uses like phone directory assistance and other such services.
So we'll still have a bit to wait for the true AI to be built - likely by some true electronics wizard.
