In terms of human memory, acquisition is the process of experiencing and storing new knowledge in memory. Memory consolidation refers to the process that occurs when a memory becomes permanent. Lastly, recall is the process of retrieving previously stored memories. According to researchers, while acquisition and recall occur while awake, memory consolidation occurs in people when they are asleep.
During sleep, given that the human brain is not consumed with experiencing stimulus from the outside world and therefore creating new memories, the brain can focus on integrating recent experiences into long term memory. The process continues to be studied, but it has been shown that the quality and quantity of sleep do in fact have an impact on one’s cognitive abilities. The ability to focus, moods, attention and concentration spans and simply the concept of clear thinking may be impacted by sleep or the lack thereof in a human being.
AI machine learning, on the other hand, is a continuous process based on experiencing and absorbing information and then algorithmically testing and establishing relationships and patterns across the data. Memory consolidation in AI is happening all the time and doesn’t vary in quality based on being sleep deprived or tired. It may also have less limitation in capacity as that continues to expand in the AI world while how to expand human capacity is still unknown.
If sleep is necessary for human memory consolidation but not in AI, and AIs don’t sleep anyway, one of those two should be quicker learners. People did have a head start, but the race is long.
