worried that AI is going to take over
that fear is so artificial you know
recently there have been a lot of people
talking about the potential dangers of
artificial intelligence in our future
Hollywood has really run away with this
concept just take a look at Avengers it
all takes the form of Ultron I'm rusty
Ward with science friction and I think
it would be irresponsible of me to allow
Jonathan to low you all into a false
sense of security about how wonderful
the future is going to be with AI I need
all of you to burn your birth
certificates right now because that is
how the sentient AI program Skynet is
going to know when and where to exactly
send the t800 s-- to eliminate you from
the timeline whoa whoa rusty Wow calm
down all right I'm here to talk about
how artificial intelligence has the
potential to make our lives and future
amazing and to calm some of those fears
very well go on thank you you know I'd
hate for there to be any science
friction between us oh boy I think that
pun might have been worse than the
inescapable threat of AI yeah well at
any rate a few people have brought up
some concerns about artificial
intelligence in the future
oh by a few people you mean physicist
Stephen Hawking entrepreneur Elon Musk
and multi billionaire philanthropist
Bill Gates exactly these are smart
forward-thinking people but I think it's
time we have a conversation about what
artificial intelligence really is you
see the AI that you and I encounter on a
daily basis is what we would call weak
AI but just because it's weak doesn't
mean it's useless in fact it can do
certain things way better than humans
can
let's take mapping software with real
traffic information as an example that
could reroute your pathway around any
traffic snarls and give you an efficient
way to get from point A to point B
now the mapping software is really good
at doing that but you wouldn't say it
was thinking and that's the rub you see
a lot of these warnings are all about
what we would call strong AI artificial
intelligence that is capable of thinking
for itself perhaps having consciousness
and making its own decisions we don't
have any machines that could do that
maybe one day we'll build one but for
the moment I would say all this doom and
gloom is putting the cart before the
horse now even if we do make machines
that one day can think there's no reason
to believe they're going to think the
way humans do they may not have
motivations or emotions I think what
we're doing here is projecting ourselves
onto our future robot overlords wait
what just a joke look artificial
intelligence is a lot like a magic trick
once you learn how it's calculating its
results the illusion that the machine is
thinking just fades away but weak AI has
an amazing potential to transform our
world responding to our needs before we
even have a chance to vocalize them this
is the future where we're largely
unaware of problems because our machines
are taking care of them before they're
even perceptible you say the machines
can't think like us yet anyway but they
can perceive through sensors and react
at a fraction of the time it takes
humans to react
let's take autonomous cars as an example
they see the world around them using an
array of sensors and because of that
they don't have to pay attention to just
one direction at a time they never get
distracted and they can react in a way
that makes human reactions look glacial
in comparison just recently there was an
autonomous car that did a road trip
across the entire United States from San
Francisco to New York it did so safely
obeying all traffic laws it never got
sleepy and never got annoyed at whatever
radio station you happen to pick and
this isn't just a publicity stunt if you
remember our conversation with Henrik
Kristensen you know he helped draft the
National robotics roadmap he told us
children born today will never have to
drive a car
thanks to autonomous vehicle technology
and it's important to remember that
these discussions were having today are
giving us guidelines on the responsible
and careful ways to design artificial
intelligence so we stand to benefit not
be in danger so I hope that makes you
feel better no it doesn't all right
rusty I get your concerns
I do understand them the unknown can be
daunting but it can also be amazing and
I say we move forward not with fear but
with wisdom with caution and together we
can boldly go where well you know let us
know in the comments where you think
artificial intelligence will take us
don't forget to do the intelligent thing
and hit the like button down there and
subscribe to forward thinking for more
amazing videos about the future and make
sure you check out the science friction
episode that Rusty made about AI it's
pretty smart and huge thanks to superfan
tala tarik who suggested that rusty and
i work together in the first place this
has been amazing
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