Spark session: thursday

Spark Sessions are blocks that include several short plenary “Spark Talks” (15-20 minutes) by laureates. Here they give insights into their current research projects, discuss their work and spark inspiration for new ideas and problem-solving approaches.

Raj Reddy: The Promise and Perils of AI
In the past, Engineering Innovation has led to tools for enhancing the Physical Capabilities of Human Beings. Over the past 60 years, using computers and AI, we have begun to develop tools for enhancing Human Mental Capabilities. Ultimately, this will lead some of us to have superhuman capabilities, like getting a month's worth of work done in a day. Such AI-enabled Innovation will lead to dramatic discoveries in every discipline, leading to the availability of products and services at a fractional cost. This improved productivity can be expected to lead the Global GDP to increase from about $100 trillion to over $1000 trillion by 2040, resulting in improved quality of life for all, including the marginal populations.

In the past decade, we have seen media hysteria about runaway AI that might enslave us or even exterminate us. By worrying about events analogous to an asteroid impacting Earth, we run the risk of throwing out the AI Baby with the bath water. The possible emergence of a new species of transhuman and post-human is thousands of years away, if ever.

More immediate threats such as a Jobless-future and Deep Fakes are natural consequences of technological advances.  Existing societal mechanisms can be used to reduce and/or eliminate the impact of such events.
Instead of AI-enabled killer weapons, we should promote the development of AI-enabled humane intelligent weapons of the future, designed for precision targeting to eliminate collateral damage to innocent bystanders and infrastructure such as schools and hospitals, and designed to disable rather than destroy the enemy.

In this talk, we will examine the opportunities and dangers of AI and suggest strategies and policies to use advances in AI to augment and enhance the human race.