The news that artificial intelligence has reached the stage of " self learning " is something that should trigger alarm in thinking people. The battle between human minds and AI breached an important barrier in 1997 when IBM's " Deep Blue " super-computer beat this worlds best Chess champion, Garry Kasparov. We have always held Chess as the ultimate battle between human minds.
Now another important barrier has fallen. In Asia a game called " Go " has held a similar position to Chess in Asian minds and been deeply competitive between masters in the culture of China, Korea and Japan. At a competition in Seoul a contest between a computer named " Alpha-Go " beat the foremost world champion 3-0.
What must disturb some people is the way Alpha-Go achieved that superiority. Firstly, the rules of this very complicated game was entered into the computers memory and then it played against humans as it learned the ropes. It quickly began to play games against itself and explored the incredible number of game moves that are possible within the confines of a board with nineteen squares as its perimeter. The computer had crossed the barrier and was now capable of " self learning ".
That is frightening ! We have created a monster that Stephen Hawking, one of our foremost scientists warns may bring about the end of the human race. We have entered the dark world of artificial intelligence where the memory chip is now capable of evolving on its own and is no longer under the control of human minds. In fact, it is already showing its superiority to the human minds that developed the first computers.
The fact that humans tasked computers to play Chess and Go introduces the inevitability that military minds in some countries will use artificial intelligence to try and gain battlefield superiority. The sort of future warfare depicted in science fiction could easily become a reality - and the history books make it very clear that over the years we developed from the stone age various leaders have emerged with ambitions to rule the world. Names that come to mind include Julius Caesar, Napoleon, Adolph Hitler and Joseph Stalin.
The cork is out of the bottle and the " Genie " of artificial intelligence is now a reality. We can be sure that in some countries it is already being tasked with weapons technology and the tactics necessary to win wars. We are already seeing the advance of " fighting machines " controlled from a far distance and capable of delivering destruction of unimaginable capacity. The very concept of war is reaching new heights.
Sadly, the future of humankind is passing from control by mere mortals into the hands of a form of intelligence that we do not even begin to understand. Compassion was a big part of human intelligence and that is fast being converted to the more coldly functional sphere of" logic ". It is quite possible that this " logic " may discard the human race as inferior - and expendable.
Our future is hidden behind a very larger question mark ! In fact, we may be complicit in our own destruction !
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