Although the past 100 years have seen the most dramatic technological upheavals to life than in all of human history, the next 100 years is set to pave the way for a multi-generational leap forward. From HBO's new series Westworld to articles and advertisements all over the web, you've likely encountered Silicon Valley's hottest new buzzword: artificial intelligence (AI). As the field develops, it seems nearly every industry is trying to understand how any current and future developments might affect them. While it's certainly an exciting time to witness such developments and ask such questions, it's now more important than ever to understand what artificial intelligence actually means, and how it's different from other industry terms (such as machine learning, analytics, and data science). When we have a firm grasp of these concepts, we can more confidently think through any implications for each industry--social impact included.

When Ross Compton had a pacemaker installed, he had a constitutional right to remain silent. One would expect his body to have the same. But when the 59-year-old's Middletown, Ohio, home erupted in flames last September, the electronic data stored in his cardiac device eventually led to his arrest and subsequent indictment on charges of arson and insurance fraud. And despite his attorney's arguments to the contrary, earlier this month Butler county judge Charles Pater held that the functioning of Compton's own body -- heartbeat included -- could be used against him at the upcoming trial. Deanna Paul (@thedeannapaul) is a former New York City prosecutor and adjunct professor of trial advocacy at Fordham University school of law.

Amazon's futuristic fleet of autonomous delivery drones could be equipped with data grabbing sensors, according to a patent granted to the firm. This would allow the vehicles to scan your home at the same time as dropping off your package. The company believes this may reveal clues that could allow it recommend products for you to purchase. Some may feel uncomfortable at the prospect of arming the self-flying devices with such snooping technology, although the patent suggests it would be opt-in service. Amazon's futuristic fleet of autonomous delivery drones could be equipped with data grabbing sensors, according to a patent (pictured) granted to the firm.

Figures released last week show that Google spent a record amount of almost $6m lobbying in Washington DC in the past three months, putting the Silicon Valley behemoth on track to be the top corporate lobbying spending in the US. Last year it ranked number two, behind Comcast. Given the increased antitrust scrutiny that is coming from the Democrats' new "Better Deal" policy platform, Donald Trump's random tweets attacking fellow tech giant Amazon for its connection to the Washington Post, and his adviser Steve Bannon's recent comments that Google and Facebook should be regulated as utilities, it is likely Google will only increase its lobbying expenditure in the next few months. The largest monopoly in America, Google controls five of the top six billion-user, universal web platforms – search, video, mobile, maps and browser – and leads in 13 of the top 14 commercial web functions, according to Scott Cleland at Precursor Consulting. As the controversial Trump-supporting PayPal billionaire Peter Thiel points out, companies like Google don't like to advertise this fact.

A famous idiom states that nothing in this life is certain other than death and taxes. Yet, of the many ways that the films and novels of science fiction have imagined the roles of robots in our high-tech future, paying taxes has generally not been one of the functions dreamed up for our android friends. Nonetheless, the futuristic-sounding concept of a "robot tax" is now a real topic in Europe and beyond, if still being quite a distance from becoming a real thing. For many years, issues around the rapid digitalization of the working environment and the increasing use of automation and robotics have energized economic and social debate. A long established argument is that increasingly rapid advances in artificial intelligence (AI) and automation - a so-called "robot revolution" - will ultimately leave huge numbers unemployed, with no sector of the labor market left untouched.

This combo of file images shows Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, left, and Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk. An online smackdown between tech titans Zuckerberg and Musk over the possible threat of artificial intelligence underlines how little most people know about the rapidly advancing technology. Two of the technology industry's most powerful leaders are at odds when it comes to artificial intelligence. Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk has a pessimistic view of the risks associated with such technology. "I keep sounding the alarm bell," Musk told the National Governors Association in June.

"It is vital that Congress ensure that any new technology is used to make transportation safer and more effective, not used to put workers at risk on the job or destroy livelihoods," Teamsters President James P. Hoffa said in a statement, adding the union wants more changes in the House measure.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) has been a technology with promise for decades. The ability to manipulate huge volumes of data quickly and efficiently, identifying patterns and quickly analyzing the most optimal solution can be applied to thousands of day-to-day scenarios. However, it is set to come of age in the era of big data and real time decisions – where AI can provide solutions to age old issues and challenges. Consider, as an example, traffic management. The first traffic management system in London was a manually operated gas-lit traffic signal, which promptly exploded two months after its introduction.

'It's not a matter of there being a set of ethics for machines and another for human beings; we argue that there is just one thing called ethics. We want to make sure that machines have this ethics built into them,' says Professor Susan Anderson, who says this needs to be an exhaustive process. 'In order to try to capture the ethical principles needed we need to have a dialogue with the machine that is centred just around whatever the domain is that the machine will be functioning in, and try to discover the ethically-relevant features that the machine will have to encounter or deal with, the prima facie duties that the machine should be aware of and the decision principles that in the last analysis should govern its behaviour.' Professor Anderson says that in the course of an'interactive dialogue' between the machine and one or more ethicists, the machine would be able to'tease out' ethical elements that are relevant to its domain. 'Like, could someone be harmed?

Software can make "decisions" when specified criteria are satisfied (for example, "buy" and "sell" decisions); and humans can use AI to help improve the quality of their own decision-making. Unlike other software, however, AI can make decisions autonomously without any human involvement. AI has huge potential to bring accuracy, efficiencies, cost savings and speed to a whole range of formerly human activities and to provide entirely new insights into market and customer behaviour. It has the capability to transform businesses and the services and products they offer. A decision to adopt AI can raise fundamental ethical and moral issues for society. These complex issues are of vital importance to our future, but they are not typically the domain of lawyers.