SINGULAR DESTINY: Implications of super intelligent machines have been explored in many films like I, Robot.
One of the founding engineers of Skype and Kazaa wants to sound a warning to the human race: fasten your seatbelts, as machines are becoming so intelligent that they could pose an existential threat.
Jaan Tallinn, in Australia at the moment, argues human-driven technological progress has largely replaced evolution as the dominant force shaping our future. Machines are becoming smarter than we are, but Tallinn warns that if we are not careful this could lead to a "sudden global ecological catastrophe".
This sounds like science fiction stuff, but consider the breadth of domains where computers have already caught up to - and then dominated - humans.
We have already programmed computers to be better than us at classic games like chess, better drivers (Google's driverless car being just one example), better at voice and face recognition and, as IBM's Watson computer proved, even better at the game Jeopardy.
The US military is experimenting with robot fighter pilots, while the majority of trading on the stock market is done by computers in what is known as algorithmic trading.
"My core main message is actually that this thing is not science fiction, this thing is not apocalyptic religion - this thing is something that needs serious consideration," said Tallinn, who gave a talk on his theory at the University of Sydney last night.
Tallinn isn't your average programmer. The Estonian is a board member of the Lifeboat Foundation (tagline "safeguarding humanity") and at university he majored in theoretical physics. His thesis looked at travelling interstellar distances using warps in space-time.
He argues we are witnessing an "intelligence explosion" - with neuroscience advancing in leaps and bounds to the point where scientists could replicate the human brain by the middle of this century.
The event when machines surpass human levels of intelligence and ability has been dubbed "the singularity".
"In my view the fact that computers caught up to humans and completely dominate humans in chess and some other domains already that says there's evidence that yes in principle they can be better programmers than humans," said Tallinn, 40.
"Once computers can program they basically take over technological progress because already today the majority of technological progress is run by software, by programming."
The question then is, how can you control something that can actually reprogram itself?
One of the founding engineers of Skype and Kazaa wants to sound a warning to the human race: fasten your seatbelts, as machines are becoming so intelligent that they could pose an existential threat.
Jaan Tallinn, in Australia at the moment, argues human-driven technological progress has largely replaced evolution as the dominant force shaping our future. Machines are becoming smarter than we are, but Tallinn warns that if we are not careful this could lead to a "sudden global ecological catastrophe".
This sounds like science fiction stuff, but consider the breadth of domains where computers have already caught up to - and then dominated - humans.
We have already programmed computers to be better than us at classic games like chess, better drivers (Google's driverless car being just one example), better at voice and face recognition and, as IBM's Watson computer proved, even better at the game Jeopardy.
The US military is experimenting with robot fighter pilots, while the majority of trading on the stock market is done by computers in what is known as algorithmic trading.
"My core main message is actually that this thing is not science fiction, this thing is not apocalyptic religion - this thing is something that needs serious consideration," said Tallinn, who gave a talk on his theory at the University of Sydney last night.
Tallinn isn't your average programmer. The Estonian is a board member of the Lifeboat Foundation (tagline "safeguarding humanity") and at university he majored in theoretical physics. His thesis looked at travelling interstellar distances using warps in space-time.
He argues we are witnessing an "intelligence explosion" - with neuroscience advancing in leaps and bounds to the point where scientists could replicate the human brain by the middle of this century.
The event when machines surpass human levels of intelligence and ability has been dubbed "the singularity".
"In my view the fact that computers caught up to humans and completely dominate humans in chess and some other domains already that says there's evidence that yes in principle they can be better programmers than humans," said Tallinn, 40.
"Once computers can program they basically take over technological progress because already today the majority of technological progress is run by software, by programming."
The question then is, how can you control something that can actually reprogram itself?
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| The Terminator movie series is built upon the concept of the Singularity Read the full article at - http://www.stuff.co.nz/technology/gadgets/7302528/Beware-the-singularity-says-Skype-founder |
