January 2015 – Page 2

Michie Survey

In a 1972 poll of sixty-seven AI and computer science experts, respondents were roughly divided between expecting human-level intelligence in 20 years, in 50 years and in more than 50 years. They were also roughly divided between considering a ‘takeover’

AI and the Big Nuclear Discontinuity

By Katja Grace, 9 January 2015 As we’ve discussed before, the advent of nuclear weapons was a striking technological discontinuity in the effectiveness of explosives. In 1940, no one had ever made an explosive twice as

The Biggest Technological Leaps

By Katja Grace, 9 January 2015 Over thousands of years, humans became better at producing explosions. A weight of explosive that would have blown up a tree stump in the year 800 could have blown

The AI Impacts Blog

By Katja Grace, 9 January 2015 Welcome to the AI Impacts blog. AI Impacts is premised on two ideas (at least!): The details of the arrival of human-level artificial intelligence matterSeven years to prepare is very different from