Inside Track
Scientists Warn: Conscious Killer Robots Could Destroy Humanity
The development of “killer robots” that could be misused already appears a given, but now experts speak of “the possibility of AI developing consciousness, which some warn could be used by machines to rebel against humans and kill us,” wrote the Daily Star on December 23.
Subhash Kak, a professor of electrical and computer engineering at Oklahoma University, told the paper that if “indeed machines become self-aware, they will be cunning and they will bide their time and choose the best moment to take over and enslave, if not kill, us.”
Yet it’s unlikely slavery is in the cards. As a commenter under the Star piece put it, “It doesn’t take the smartest human to realize that if ‘conscious’ AI robots wanted slaves, they would build ‘less-conscious’ robots, rather than rely on such an ineffective and unpredictable set of tools as the human race. They would simply eliminate all humans.”
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