The idea of a rogue AI on a mission to hunt down every last human being and wipe us off the face of the planet is not a new one. It has been explored quite a bit in several TV shows and movies.
Up until even a decade ago, we would laugh this possibility off by saying that it is nothing but science fiction and such a thing, if even possible, would probably take centuries by which time we would have been dead anyways.
During the more recent times however, the discussions regarding such a threat have taken a more serious tone as it is now only a matter of when and not if, and even the predicted time is not that far away.
Experts, like Google’s Ray Kurzweil, who is a renowned futurist, believe that by 2045, the machines will get smarter than us humans, which many consider as the beginning of the end of mankind.
Artificial Intelligence is being developed to augment human life, so that, we can better use our time and energy for other areas where they are more suited while the other aspects can be handled by AI which it is excellent at.
AI could in fact be the invention that leads to all other inventions. Seriously, if an AI is advanced enough, we wouldn’t even need to strive for technological and scientific progress. All that would be taken care by it without any input from us. Can you imagine what such an AI can’t do?
Having such a great technological achievement by our side would be great as far as it is safe and therein lies the problem. We just can’t ensure that the AI won’t turn against us.
One reason for that is we just can’t imagine the abilities an AI will be capable of learning and how it will use those and another reason is that machines don’t have emotions and such a powerful entity without empathy or morals, could easily wipe us off based on a single logical conclusion.
This potential problem has become so real that the idea of us merging with machines has started to get some real traction. The logic is, if you can’t beat them, join them.
The creation of artificial organs and drugs that enhance our capabilities have been progressing really fast and could one day give us superhuman abilities on demand, but this is not the extent to which the merger is being planned.
Elon Musk, who is often called the real world Iron Man, is a strong believer that AI will turn against us and thus he has started a research company to help ensure the development of a safe AI. But his efforts don’t end there.
He has also co-founded Neuralink to develop implantable brain-computer interface technology that will in essence, help us ‘merge with the machines’ and gain similar capabilities to that of an AI.
We are venturing into sci-fi realm here but it is very possible in the not so distant future. With the neural lace technology, we would be able to connect to the internet, enhance our memories, intelligence, brain activity and so much more.
An argument can be made that such a move, if accepted by entire humanity, would still end up destroying who we are today and create Human 2.0. If becoming one with the AI, is the only way of keeping us alive and relevant, does that mean we are already lost?
