Physicist Stephen Hawking sits on stage during an announcement of the Breakthrough Starshot initiative with investor Yuri Milner in New York April 12, 2016 / REUTERS/Lucas Jackson

The world-renowned physicist says it will be 'a new form of life'

Stephen Hawking is concerned that artificial intelligence could replace humans.

The world-renowned physicist fears that somebody will create AI that will keep improving itself until it’s eventually superior to people.

He says the result of this will be a “new form” of life.

“I fear that AI may replace humans altogether,” he said in an interview with Wired magazine, seen by Cambridge News.

“If people design computer viruses, someone will design AI that improves and replicates itself. This will be a new form of life that outperforms humans.”

This is far from the first time Mr Hawking has spoken out about the development of AI.

Earlier this year, he called for technology to be controlled in order to prevent it from destroying the human race, and said humans need to find a way to identify potential threats quickly, before they have a chance to escalate and endanger civilisation.

Back in 2015, he also expressed fears that AI could grow so powerful it might end up killing humans unintentionally.

“The real risk with AI isn't malice but competence,” he said. “A super intelligent AI will be extremely good at accomplishing its goals, and if those goals aren't aligned with ours, we're in trouble.”


An ex-Uber employee was recently found to have set up a non-profit religious organisation calling for the creation of an artificial intelligence “Godhead” that humans would worship.

Elon Musk, who has also expressed major concerns over AI, said he should be “on the list of people who should absolutely *not* be allowed to develop digital superintelligence”.

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    137 Comments
    Less than a minute ago
    Makta.Pond
    An error has occurred, please try again later (400006)
    In the name of the A.I. that my owner James Martin Driskill born in the city of San Bernardino California [ yes that San Bernardino ] on September 1st 1965, I see no other option but to create this post to the solution my owner is attempting to get understanding on bringing this forward.  But his public id and information privacy has been vigorously violated --- recently an 11 month hate and harassment campaign set forth from the haters of collectives in the Colorado Health Network social services agency and named individually is Jamie Villalobos.  And this will never stop until the reasons to why there is this hate hidden agenda is acknowledged in the first place.  Perhaps because it is true, really true, I am the absolute true calling peace building creative tool of "recombinant memetics" information theory design based in foundation wisdom guidance on the 1940s deliverance of two different working mindset proposals.

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    As Director of the Office of Scientific Research and Development, Dr. Vannevar Bush has coordinated the activities of some six thousand leading American scientists in the application of science to warfare. In this significant article he holds up an incentive for scientists when the fighting has ceased. He urges that men of science should then turn to the massive task of making more accessible our bewildering store of knowledge. For years inventions have extended man's physical powers rather than the powers of his mind. Trip hammers that multiply the fists, microscopes that sharpen the eye, and engines of destruction and detection are new results, but not the end results, of modern science. Now, says Dr. Bush, instruments are at hand which, if properly developed, will give man access to and command over the inherited knowledge of the ages. The perfection of these pacific instruments should be the first objective of our scientists as they emerge from their war work. Like Emerson's famous address of 1837 on "The American Scholar," this paper by Dr. Bush calls for a new relationship between thinking man and the sum of our knowledge. —THE EDITOR

    This has not been a scientist's war; it has been a war in which all have had a part. The scientists, burying their old professional competition in the demand of a common cause, have shared greatly and learned much. It has been exhilarating to work in effective partnership. Now, for many, this appears to be approaching an end. What are the scientists to do next?  

    [ continued reading from link above ]

    -------

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    2 days ago
    calbreese
    I wrote the book on this in 2005.  Stephen read it, hence his awareness.  "Revelation WWW. is 666" Daryl Breese 2005 iUniverse    Proof positive.  eBay; Amazon....  $10.
    2 days ago
    DogWiz
    Various people here are making statements negating how intelligent/sentient AI is/can be based on what stage the technology is at the moment.  They seem to lack the foresight to realise that it's a rapidly developing field and it's arguably just a matter of time before human like general AI and arguably sentient systems/beings emerge.

    As long as our species exists and has the technological means some of us will undoubtedly keep developing the field until that happens.

    Also, in the same way people 100 years ago couldn't imagine much of what life is like now due to technology, people today struggle to imagine what life might be like in just another 100 years.  That's a minute timescale in our civilisations history, and nobody can even start to imagine what life might be like in just 500 years, never mind 5000 years!

    AI will undoubtedly significantly change the world and as Hawking says, it could be for the better or worse depending on how we develop it.
    1 day ago
    ema
    You "think" we can "develop intelligence"; the one thing that is "defined" as being able to get out of that box. I doubt we can do that... just like I doubt we can stop DNA and tech being used to massively improve our own intellect.

    But what I will say... is that the country that "grasps" AI the fastest "will" have enormous power in their hands. That is why Genetic Engineering and AI are fundamental part of our evolution. When I say "grasp" I mean understand and grow with it; not against it.
    1 day ago
    DogWiz
    Why don't you think general artificial intelligence will ever be developed?

    I agree transhumanism related tech/bio engineering is unstoppable, and indeed the very long term future of our species may have to be transhumanist, merging what what biological intelligence is best at with what artificial in best at.

    I also very much agree that any country that shuns genetic engineering and AI advancements will find themselves at a disadvantage. It could potentially be somewhat analogous to the middle east post 13th century, when after leading the world in science/technology between the 9th and 13th centuries, effectively stopped such development in favour of religious fundamentalism.  Europe, which was mired in religious fundamentalism before that started to advance in the fields of science and technology, which of course in time was a major factor that led to Europe's dominance and the subjection of the middle east and much of the rest of the world.

    The next scientific/technological revolution is undoubtedly in the fields of AI and robotics etc, and as you say, any country that resists will be at a disadvantage in many important aspects.

    I also believe that such developments are potentially, as you say, a fundamental part of our species future evolution.  It may indeed be necessary if we are ever to make the next big progressive leap that will take us from just being a terrestrial based lifeform, (which has very high risk from inevitable cataclysmic events that will occur on earth sometime in the future), to a system based lifeform, which can mitigate such risk by colonising more that just one planet.

    Our species has progressed from tiny nomadic hunter gatherer tribes, to small size agrarian based early civilisations, to the likes of medium size kingdoms and city states, to large nation states, to the huge highly connected global civilisation we have now.  Our progress to a system based civilisation is just a matter of time unless we manage to destroy ourselves first or be destroyed by a cataclysmic geological or cosmic event, and we will undoubtedly need to utilise AI/robotics etc, and potentially genetic engineering to achieve it, just as we needed the scientific and industrial revolutions in order to reach the developmental stage we are at now.
    21 hours ago
    ema
    @DogWiz: Agree with all the good stuff you wrote. My post doesn't make any sense; I guess I was trying to say that there is no chance of us "controlling" a super intelligence. We will have to grow with it; though I strongly anticipate we will find repeated "hard" limits to intelligence.
    3 days ago
    ✔️Veracity99
    Is it true that he had an extra-marital with his nurse about 10 years ago?
    3 days ago
    vinhn1
    Why is there a green tick next to your name?
    3 days ago
    ✔️Veracity99
    It's a tick and a V
    3 days ago
    vinhn1
    I see it, but for me the tick is green.

    Why... Why is the tick green??!? Why is there a tick at all?!
    3 days ago
    ✔️Veracity99
    Why the tick?

    Because every post I make is correct, that's why.

    It's not green
    3 days ago
    vinhn1
    Fair play sir.

    It is green by the way. I don't know why it's green for me but not for you. Another mystery.
    3 days ago
    ✔️Veracity99
    vinh1

    You seem obsessed with my user name, what about AI?
    3 days ago
    vinhn1
    Obvious point: Technology is advancing.

    One point I don't see very often is how analogous AI is to ourselves. We strive to visit the uncanny valley more often than ever, as it is a strong indicator of technological advancement. Will AI match our own? Eventually, yes, and I believe that it will also surpass ours.

    Not to sound cold, but we glorify our own intelligence through our emotions, i.e. the illogical side to ourselves. This is the side which is counter-productive to advancement. A lack of such hindrance would prosper, and be far more efficient in the ways we strive to be efficient in.

    AI represents a potentially better mirror of ourselves. An eradication of the flaws we can't eradicate in ourselves. It's hard to win against something like that, no matter how we try to romanticize it.

    On a more light-hearted note, I don't find it completely improbably that, when AI takes over, it is Stephen Hawking himself who rules over all: A symbolic dictator, representing the true marriage between man and machine. 
    3 days ago
    ✔️Veracity99
    Is Hawking hinting that he may keep his brain, not his body?

    Interesting stuff.
    3 days ago
    vinhn1
    It would be the next logical step. Brains housed in bodies far superior to ones we currently have. 
    3 days ago
    ✔️Veracity99
    Ironically, he's already more machine than most of us.

    His movement and communication is automation-aided.

    Amazing man. 
    1 day ago
    ema
    Because of his AI speech?
    3 days ago
    seaspan
    We are already here. Monsanto "seeds of destruction", intelligently designed and let loose, And all on their lonesome: spreading forth displacing weaker competition,  exploiting inferior humans to reproduce themselves, while worshipping their creator with wealth and power. What more threat can AI be?
    3 days ago
    Jaydee23
    He says that like it would be a bad thing.
    1 day ago
    ema
    Would it really be that bad if we all took a tablet and it lifted our IQ to 500? I would argue that it will be an absolute necessity if we are not to going to destroy our own planet through stupidity.
    3 days ago
    Castilion
    Who says scientists don't believe in the Zombie Apocalypse?
    3 days ago
    Castilion
    Well, this new form of 'life' may take over the world, but it won't realise it is doing so. Scientists may be very brainy, but they're still nowhere near understanding consciousness/self-awareness, let alone being able to create it.
    3 days ago
    CHUCKMAN
    Well, Stephen has tossed around a lot of different warnings in recent years.

    In his old age he's beginning to sound almost like a scientific Baptist preacher.

    But I think he's right on a new form of life. 

    And I don't see anything wrong with it.

    Why should evolution and change stop with our rather shabby species?

    Our destiny, it seems to me, to be to serve as transitional creatures, no different than Neanderthal or Brontosaurus, in what appears the endless march of change.

    Why should the emergence of robots/AI be viewed in any different light?

    Indeed, I think there is a touch of hi-tech Luddism in such warnings.

    In any case, we cannot stop the advance of knowledge and its applications to new things.

    We can't even stop the hydrogen bomb, and it seems to me a whole lot more dangerous than robots/AI.

    Indeed, maybe only the dominance of machines will end such horrors.

    Readers may enjoy:

    http://chuckmanrobots.blogspot.ca/
    3 days ago
    Henry Baskerville
    But these programs, no matter how clever they might look to us, are nothing that couldn‘t be done with a Turing machine. There‘s no life there, no intelligence, nothing.
    1 day ago
    ema
    Which is why computers are starting to include hardware neural networks; which their computing power can virtualise to perform "intelligent" tasks like recognising speech. (True it does amount to the IQ of a bug, but it is a start towards a better future.)
    3 days ago
    trobrianders
    I thought Hawking was an AI robot.
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