The idea of having sex with a robot might seem more like something out of a science fiction film. But one in five of us are now open to the idea, according to new research. Now, one academic claims droids could also lead to changes in the sex industry, replacing prostitutes to help stamp out sexual slavery and trafficking. Sex robots could be a good substitute for human prostitutes. Dr John Danaher, a lecturer in business at NUI Galway believes that sex robots could be a good substitute for human prostitutes.

The field of artificial intelligence has spawned a vast range of subset fields and terms: machine learning, neural networks, deep learning and cognitive computing, to name but a few. However here we will turn our attention to the specific term'artificial general intelligence', thanks to the Portland-based AI company Kimera Systems' (momentous) claim to have launched the world's first ever example, called Nigel. The AGI Society defines artificial general intelligence as "an emerging field aiming at the building of "thinking machines"; that is general-purpose systems with intelligence comparable to that of the human mind (and perhaps ultimately well beyond human general intelligence)". AGI would, in theory, be able to perform any intellectual feat a human can. You can now perhaps see why a claim to have launched the world's first ever AGI might be a tad ambitious, to say the least.

UNITED NATIONS The United Nations is ready to deliver aid into Syria's Aleppo, but needs commitments from all parties in the war - not just Russia - to abide by a 48-hour humanitarian truce, the U.N. aid chief, angered by lack of assistance to civilians, said on Monday.

Marco, what can we do about AI? Marco, are we doing enough on AI?" The questions all come from senior executives, desperate to harness the potential that AI promises. Yet Bressan is bemused by how the technology is talked about at board level and in the media. "Currently it denotes a vision of the future; an aspect of the sci-fi imagination; something that you still can't do. But the truth is senior financial executives have been doing AI-related work, research and deployment of products for years." At the most rudimentary level, AI involves teaching machines to learn and to interact in order to undertake cognitive tasks that were usually performed by humans. The type of AI featured in sci-fi films in which machines possess a human-like intelligence, sometimes referred to as general artificial intelligence, remains a distant and elusive prospect. The most optimistic experts, such as Google's director of engineering, Ray Kurzweil, predict that AI will be able to outsmart humans by 2029. Conservative predictions expect this to take at least 100 years, if at all. Of more immediate relevance to those working in financial services is the deployment of narrow artificial intelligence. These applications undertake specific tasks using problem solving, deduction, reasoning and natural language processing. Such programmes are being applied across financial services, from the development of customer service programmes that use natural language processing to manage and field customer queries, through to programmes that can conduct financial research and make sophisticated models of financial markets to identify trading opportunities. The potential for narrow applications has led to a boom in AI investment. Technology companies are undoubtedly leading the way. In 2015 the giants of AI – Microsoft, Google and Facebook – spent 8.5 billion on AI research, acquisitions and talent. In comparison, financial institutions have made a cautious foray into the field. A handful are making investments by hiring high-level data scientists or acquiring AI companies. The hedge fund Bridgewater Associates hired the former chief engineer behind IBM's Watson supercomputer. BlackRock has also been busy hiring some high-profile names and has announced a joint venture with Google to explore how to use AI to improve investment decision-making. Goldman Sachs has invested in a number of promising AI start-ups, including the financial research platform Kensho. Yet most financial institutions have been slow to adopt AI, even though it is likely to usher in a new type of bank, with data and technology as its heart. Failure to adapt may lead to extinction for some. As Neil Dwane, global strategist at Allianz Global Investors, explains: "Technological competence is absolutely essential for at least staying in the game.

Nordea is on the hunt for startups developing new applications in artificial intelligence and blockchain-based products for its next fintech accelerator programme which kicks off in the autumn in Stockholm and Helsinki.

China's Cheetah Mobile, considered the world's leading mobile security and utility app developer, is preparing to accelerate its transition into a viable content-focused business, following a US 57 million purchase of media app operator News Republic in the second quarter. "This is a huge step for us," chief technology officer Charles Fan Chenggong told the South China Morning Post. "We can potentially reshape the news industry by introducing a strong, artificial intelligence-driven, personal news delivery service." The acquisition marks the most-ambitious bet to date by the New York-traded Cheetah Mobile, amid its recent struggle to boost advertising income. Analysts at the Blue Lotus Research Institute in Hong Kong said Cheetah had good "synergy" with News Republic, which works with more than 1,650 media partners.

Iraq built an armed robotic vehicle, according to Baghdad Post, and it could be used to take back a town occupied by ISIS. Based on Defense One's translation of the story, the robot is car-sized and tank-like, equipped with an automatic machine gun and a rocket launcher. It also has four cameras to be able to show operators its field of view, since it's controlled using a laptop from a kilometer away. That distance means its operators still have to be on the battlefield, but at least they can stay hidden and safe while the machine does its job. It's not exactly clear who built this vehicle nicknamed "Alrobot" (that's Arabic for robot).

The hottest news last week came out of the Intel INTC Developer Forum (IDF) 2016. But Facebook's FB decision to open source its artificial intelligence (A.I.) research, Alphabet's GOOGL Duo and Oracle ORCL asking for a retrial in its case against Alphabet over Java also made headlines. This was a mega event where Intel talked about everything but PCs. The company seems to think that the next big thing driving chip growth for PCs is VR capabilities (since it's a computationally intensive exercise, it's a good way to sell its chips). To that end, it announced Project Alloy, a reference design for cordless headgear that merges the AR and VR worlds and runs on Microsoft's MSFT Windows Holographic OS.

It's hard to imagine 2016 Presidential election candidates trying to figure out how to use an AI personal assistant, much less lead us into a new era of a digital solutions economy powered by AI. For the last 50 years, technology has been the fundamental driving force for the growth of our economy. My grandparents, who were born in Europe saw the advent of truly life altering technologies at that time such as automobiles, electricity and refrigeration. Over the years being a CTO and venture capitalist, I've recognized that the rate of change and innovation have been accelerating – in particular over the past decade it seems. Facebook, a social networking service was founded by Mark Zuckerberg with his Harvard roommates in 2004.

M erely twenty years ago, artificial intelligence (AI) was the plot line in movies, books, and short stories. While it loomed on the horizon, it is only now getting the attention of world, and business leaders. A few days into 2016, Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook announced that he plans to spend 2016 developing an AI system to help run his life. He stated in his Facebook post: "My personal challenge for 2016 is to build a simple AI to run my home and help me with my work. You can think of it kind of like Jarvis in Iron Man."