Science & Technology

Tech giants team up to form AI ethics board

By T.K. Randall
September 29, 2016

Image: AI-generated (Midjourney) Some of the world's most prominent scientists and technology entrepreneurs, including Professor Stephen Hawking and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, have repeatedly warned in recent years of the dangers we might face should rogue intelligent machines ever manage to take hold.

Now with computers becoming increasingly sophisticated and with several major firms including Google working on AI technology, a new partnership has been arranged in an effort to avoid any future disasters and to ensure that AI research remains safe and beneficial to mankind.

So far the group consists of Amazon, Facebook, Google, Microsoft and IBM however it is likely that others, including Apple, will also be joining in the not-too-distant future.

"The objective of the Partnership on AI is to address opportunities and challenges with AI technologies to benefit people and society," the group wrote in a statement.Artificial Intelligence has managed to gain something of a negative reputation over the years thanks to movies such as The Terminator and The Matrix which depict merciless and deadly AI machines.

Even with the limited capabilities of today's AI there have already been disasters such as the death of a Tesla car driver when the autopilot failed to spot a trailer crossing the road earlier this year.

"These days, the AI technologies are touching so many aspects of our lives that people are making their own decisions and going forward," said computer scientist Prof Subbarao Kambhampati.

"And most of the times, things work out well, but sometimes they haven't worked out all that well."

Source: NPR.org

Tags: Artificial Intelligence