Indeed, there are several ways to consider what AI is. The first – and the most common – is to look at the sought-after outcome of AI research: roughly speaking, either the "creation and study of machines that behave in a way that denotes intelligence (note: whatever'behave' may mean)" or "the creation and study of machines that think (note: whatever'think' may mean)". The second way to define AI is by looking at its components or sub-problems it is aiming to solve. The ones you'll most often hear of are: We can't resist adding a more cultural – or aspirational – way to define artificial intelligence, suggested in 1998 by Astro Teller (now CEO of X, Alphabet's "moonshot factory"): "AI is the science of how to get machines to do the things they do in the movies." Indeed, this definition is not far from the concepts of Artificial General Intelligence (or strong AI or full AI) and Artificial Super Intelligence (or superintelligence), of which the examples abound in the works of science fiction.

An artificial intelligence accurately predicted Donald Trump's less-than-stellar first 100-day approval rating down to the percentage point. Unanimous AI was challenged by reporters at Modern Trader magazine to use its Swarm AI to predict the president's rating at the end of his first milestone in office. The machine correctly came up with the historically low figure of 42 percent--the same result presented by the latest ABC News/Washington Post polls. Not every outlet came up with the same approval rating for Trump's first 100 days. The CNN/ORC poll gave the president a 44 percent approval rating, while Gallup puts it at an even lower 41 percent.

Reporters called it the robot, but its physical presence was hardly felt. It was almost invisible, just a Microsoft Excel macro that could write a fairly detailed stock-market report that could then be edited and polished by a human journalist. But when Reuters introduced the robot to its newsroom in 2007 -- just before the financial crisis -- it was an early sign that manufacturing was not the only industry that automation was infiltrating. White-collar workers in fields like journalism, finance, medicine, and law are seeing an increasing use of machines, but one much less damaging to workers' job prospects. Unlike in manufacturing, where machines can take over entire factory floors in a physical, almost menacing way, machine learning and artificial intelligence so far are playing fairly benign roles in the professional world.

Dave Wakeling of the English Beat performs at the Tribeca Film Festival. Dave Wakeling of the English Beat performs at the Tribeca Film Festival. One of the great advantages of a gathering like the Tribeca Film Festival is the sheer variety of what's on offer -- not just the usual array of movie screenings, but television and technology programming, music performances, gaming sessions and plenty of talks with well-known personalities. From one vantage, of course, that can seem like chaos. And granted, the fest's many niches can make for an overwhelming, at times muddying affair.

I suppose I could sit here and fret over a day in the not-too-distant future when a robot powered by artificial intelligence(AI) will spit out newspaper columns like this one, rendering redundant columnists like me. After all, there have been reports that computers can already churn out news reports that read almost as well as those written by journalists, and in a fraction of the time taken. The thought of being replaced by software is depressing and, I might add, self-defeating. That is why I disagree with the way technological advances and the future of work are all too often framed in either-or terms: either robot or human worker, either AI or human brain. Here are a few recent examples of headlines in local media that fall into this category: "AI may replace a third of graduate jobs: Study", published on April 6; "Evidence that robots are winning the race for American jobs", published on March 30; and "Robots may take over 10 million jobs in Britain in 15 years", published on March 25. Such reports reflect how automation and AI are more often than not viewed - not just in Singapore but in other parts of the world too - as threats to jobs and human well-being.

Today on In Case You Missed It: David Hasselhoff stars in a short film about an AI that takes over people's lives and decides what they should do and say. The kicker is that all of The Hoff's lines were written by -- you guessed it -- an AI. As M. Night Shyamalan would say, what a twist! We also take a look at MIT's newest homebuilding tool, a gigantic tank-treaded 3D printer called the Digital Construction Platform. It's armed with all sorts of appendages, including extruders, welding guns and scoop buckets.

Artificial intelligence and the Internet of Things are already transforming modern life, from voice-activated personal assistants, to self-parking cars, to self-configuring conference rooms, to systems that help doctors diagnose disease. As more things become interconnected and AI-enabled, our world becomes smarter, more convenient and more productive. But it also becomes more vulnerable. As the number of connected devices grows--not just smart ones, but also single-purpose sensors capturing the data that fuels AI, like sound, temperature and movement--we vastly increase our exposure to attack. Last October, the Mirai botnet took advantage of hacked IoT devices to take high profile websites such as Twitter, Reddit, Netflix, Airbnb--and, it was rumored (incorrectly), the entire nation of Liberia.

Chinese billionaire has said that the world's best CEO will be a robot within the next 30 years. The 52-year-old founder of Alibaba - China's equivalent of eBay and the world's largest retail platform - warned that robots will bring'far more pain than happiness' in the next three decades. But he added that artificial intelligence will ultimately improve our everyday lives. Self-made billionaire and China's second richest man Jack Ma (pictured) has warned that robots rule over the world's biggest companies within 30 years Ma, who is worth £22.8 billion ($28.4 billion), said that advances in technology will render CEOs irrelevant within the next 30 years. 'In 30 years, a robot will likely be on the cover of Time Magazine as the best CEO,' Ma said in a speech over the weekend at an entrepreneurship conference in central China, according to CNN.

China's talking robot Jia Jia had a dismal first interview in English where she forgot where the Great Wall of China was. The mechanical marvel has been sent back to humanoid school to hone her skills after stumbling over basic words and phrases during the Skype interview. Jia Jia was unable to respond to basic questions about the number of letters in the alphabet or describe the American journalist she was talking to. Chinese robot Jia Jia (right) was interviewed by Kevin Kelly (left) co-founder of Wired magazine over Skype but the mechanical marvel's conversation was not coherent It took the team three years to complete the robot, which can speak, show micro-expressions, move its lips and body, yet seems to hold its head in a submissive manner. The humanoid is programmed to recognise human/machine interaction, has autonomous position and navigation and offers services based on cloud technology. This humanoid has natural eye movement, speech that is in sync with its lip movement and refers to its male creators as'lords'.

Researchers have known that "artificial neurons" could carry out logical functions--i.e., learn the way humans do--since 1943. The term "artificial intelligence" has been around since its introduction at a science conference at Dartmouth University in 1956. But only in the past several years have we started seeing theory put into practice the way those researchers imagined. We now have machines that can translate languages, compose music, write novels, and operate vehicles. So what might the implications of these developments be for educators and students? The primary goal of AI research may be to teach machines how to learn, thereby automating some of the tasks that complicate our everyday lives, but brain scientists are saying it goes both ways: We now know more about human learning as a result of machine learning, and it has some exciting implications for the classroom.