Thanks Greg, I'm sixty years old and grew up when every one said the world was going to be destroyed in a thermonuclear war, then it was acid rain, then it was nano technology (covering the world in a layer of scum!), then it was the millennium bug, currently its climate change and it looks like people are starting to worry about AI. Even the Prime minister is at it, perhaps as a cover for his failed short term policies. Humans are fundamentally neurotic - perhaps it gives us an evolutionary edge, always being on the lookout for new threats, but if you step back and take an overview of humanity, maybe you will see what the real problems are.  

However, my point is, take care of today (with an eye on the mid term), the current problems and the future will look after itself. Who can predict the future with any degree of certainty anyway, so why worry?  Its correct that long term thinking is needed to tackle climate change, but not problems like Palestine / Israel or Putin's and Xi Jinping's ideology that threatens Europe and Asia or Trumps attack on democracy, all of which are trying to drag us back to repeat past failures.  Long term thinking should not be used to avoid tackling short term problems. 

From what I've read of science, biology, neurology, psychology, politics, economics, history, philosophy we are on the verge of a breakthrough in new thought and maybe because AI can pull vast pools of knowledge together and perhaps eliminate our biases and prejudices, bring about great change for the better. This is not something to be afraid of, but something to embrace, but of course caution is needed and a simple fail safe button should be built in  if we don't like the outputs. 

Thanks for reading. 

Regards and good luck with your endeavours. Never stop learning, but keep it real.

Thanks for for reply. The only threat to humanity comes from humanity. AI, like any other tool such as atomic weapons or dynamite will be used for good or bad by humans. AI is powerful and because its a new technology, it's impact on the future debatable, but this has been the case ever since humans invented flint tools. 

I say the fundamental problem is how to steer humanity away from improper use of technology, which can be achieved by first understanding human behaviors and  motivations, then by the widespread dispersion of this knowledge and finally by exposing the futility of such behaviour in our globalised, interconnected and interdependent society. 

If the end of humanity does happen, it will not be due to AI, pandemics or atomic weapons, it will because one group of humans, decided it wanted to get an advantage over another group of humans and ignored all other considerations. Understand why and we may be able to find a solution. 

Climate change is wrecking the planet,  Putin is trying to start World War Three and the middle east is turning into a blood bath. Mean while some people hide from reality and worry about a perceived threat from the latest tools that humanity has invented.  

Is their intelligent life on earth? I see little evidence to support that argument.

Fears over AI are based on a fallacy. The fallacy is that whatever the output of an AI system is, humans will use it regardless.  This is obviously not true, humans are not slaves to AI masters and can choose to use, ignore or question the outputs. Scientists are not solely responsible for how their discoveries are used, we all are. Scientists should be open and explain what they are doing and discovering but we should still boldly go, or is that go boldly, into the future.

The posting is concerned about deadly chemical weapons. Well, if you speak to a toxicologist I'm sure they will tell you that anything can kill you, it just depends on the dose. The world is already full of toxins. 

Hi JasperGeh

Thanks for you comments. I take your point that I do not make citations references etc. I'm not an academic, so I don't have to follows rules and can write with complete freedom. It's great therapy for me at least!

 I guess EA is not the social group for me, so I wish you all well and I will continue with my solo actions of writing to Ambassadors, newspapers, Politicians, Religious leaders, MP's  and any one else who might listen and has power to make the world a better place. I put my faith in the chaos theory, that a small insignificant butterfly has a small non zero probability of  creating a storm one day.

Keep up the good work, but apologies for wasting your valuable time.

Best Regards 

Trevor Prew

My apologies to Plex. Please excuse my newbie error.