Daily Times

The way to prevent hacking is the same as it is for computers: software updates are the key. Vendors who can provide those updates in a timely, efficient manner from the get go will gain advantage over others. Smart cars are not all bad. Not driving means that we have all the more time to be ‘connected’. This connectivity could increase productivity as commuting will no longer be lost time. It could allow for more happy Facebooking and chatting with friends and family or strangers, whatever your pleasure. Multitasking is a prerequisite of the “survival of the fittest race” for the millennials. ‘Auto utopia’ should elevate this to a whole new level. But, apparently, there are all kinds of parameters that will determine whether the environment inside the car is conducive to comfort and therefore productivity or not, starting with the speed with which the car stops and starts. It is not like a high-speed train that ensures smoothness.

Still, on top of that there are hopes of reduced congestion as the smart cars talk to each other and increased access for the disabled and elderly who otherwise cannot get around without other humans. One interesting question posed by an article was: “And as humans drive less and less, will we not get worse at it? Does that not make us a terrible backup system?” In the case of the aviation industry, being out of manual practice makes for worse landings when the pilots become used to flying on auto. Will it mean the same for cars?

The most important impact of breakthroughs in artificial intelligence is the way technology will affect humans. An excellent piece on CNET called ‘Google exec: with robots in our brains, we’ll be godlike’ is a must-read. The writer comments in sharp style on what Google’s director of engineering, Ray Kurzweil, a well-known inventor and futurist, predicts” “humans will be hybrid robots by 2030”. He goes on to explain Kurzweil’s view that “when nanobots are implanted into our brains so we can expand our intelligence by directly tapping into the internet, the brain will develop in the same way my smartphone has”. But, efficiency aside, he asserts that the part-human, part-robot existence will be one of increased sensibilities. “We are going to be more musical. We are going to be funnier. We are going to be better at expressing loving sentiment and will create more-profound means of expression.” In other words, we are going to be perfect.

Google loves to project that it has the Midas touch. Everything it will invent and discover will make the world remarkable and us exponentially wonderful. But Elon Tusk, the CEO of Tesla and best friend of Larry Page, co-founder of Google, is worried that his friend and his company “which is investing heavily into artificial intelligence, might eventually cause the downfall of humanity by eventually creating a breed of super intelligent robots that will exterminate us.” At least the two have honesty in their friendship! Google has recently bought a number of robotics companies, including Boston Dynamics, “famous for its animal-like four-legged machines with somewhat creepy gaits, as well as the humanoid Atlas. One of Boston Dynamics’ projects, the Big Dog, was developed for and funded by the US military.” Who knew the company that provided us with the best search engine for the internet had aspirations to be the world’s largest defence contractor?

Meanwhile, other world-renowned scientists like Stephen Hawking have been giving interview after interview, addressing global conferences about the uncontrollability of artificial intelligence. Speaking at the Zeitgeist Conference in London, Hawking said: “Computers will overtake humans with artificial intelligence at some point within the next 100 years. When that happens, we need to make sure the computers have goals aligned with ours,” according to a report in Geek. He thinks that “the development of full artificial intelligence could spell the end of the human race”. Why? In an interview with the BBC in December he explains that “Artificial intelligence poses no threat to the human race today but could in the future as machines — specifically robots — become smarter, bigger and stronger than their human developers. It would take off on its own and re-design itself at an ever-increasing rate. Humans, who are limited by slow biological evolution, could not compete, and would be superseded.”

In July 2015, Steve Wozniak, the co-founder of Apple, along with 700 researchers and 600 other experts, signed a letter and sent it to the UN warning that the use of artificial intelligence to make weapons and soldiers would create an inevitable global arms race that would likely wipe out humanity, which can only be “prevented by a ban on offensive autonomous weapons beyond meaningful human control.” Will it happen? Likely not. Companies like Google have a presence beyond financial markets and the defence industry. They have a penetration in politics that is unprecedented. Since Mr Obama took office, “employees of the Mountain View, California company have visited the White House for meetings with senior officials about 230 times, or an average of roughly once a week,” according to the visitor logs reviewed by the Wall Street Journal compared to 60 or so by rival company Comcast. “On November 6, 2012, the night of Mr Obama’s re-election, Mr Schmidt (co-founder of Google) was personally overseeing a voter-turnout software system for Mr Obama. A few weeks later, a key Google lobbyist and senior anti-trust lawyer at the company went to the White House to meet with one of Mr Obama’s technology advisers. By the end of the month, the Federal Trade Commission had decided not to file an anti-trust lawsuit against the company, according to the agency’s internal emails.” With corporations in the driver’s seat of political campaigns selecting presidential candidates and later determining White House policy, there is little hope for the common man anywhere.

(To be continued)

The writer is a freelance columnist