Scary Smart: Scary Smart: The Future of Artificial Intelligence and How You Can Save Our World

‘Change is the only constant.’ I’m sure you’ve heard that expression before. It’s inspiring but, unfortunately, not true. Any analysis of the history of technology shows that technological change is not constant. It’s exponential. An exponential trend is a trend that rises, or expands, at an accelerating rate.

It’s not the seed, it’s the field that makes us who we are.

The Technology Development Curve represents the typical progress made for a new technology over time. It looks like a standard hockey stick chart, which is normally used to describe events that accelerate rapidly after a specific “breakout point”– only, with tech development, the handle of the stick is almost horizontal.

in physics the singularity is an event horizon beyond which it is impossible to predict what will happen because the conditions beyond it change, as compared to our familiar physical universe.

We are surrounded by technological magic and yet we tend to discount it all.

One scenario that is played out less often in sci-fi is where AI supports humanity but is on the wrong side – the aggressive nations or evil villains.

If emotions stem from logic and more intelligence leads to a wider spectrum of emotions, then think about this for a minute: will the machines – which we agreed will be smarter than we are – feel emotions? Absolutely!

The underlying principle in our relationship with the machines is our desire to control them. This will surely lead them to mistrust us. We are starting with mistrust and our actions reflect that position.

Ethics, in that definition, are the operating manual describing how we should act in situations according to an agreed set of moralities. Ethics don’t just set the moral principles concerning the distinction between right and wrong. They also define what would be considered good and bad behaviour as a result.