Peter Clark is a senior research manager at the Allen Institute for Artificial Intelligence, overseeing Project Aristo, an effort to build an AI system with the ability to answer questions from standardized exams, starting on 4th grade science tests, with the goal of advancing to higher grades in the future. Clark was the featured speaker this week for the 2016 corporate kickoff event for Geeks Give Back, an annual philanthropic campaign presented by Bank of America in partnership with GeekWire, benefitting the Washington State Opportunity Scholarship program. Clark gave an overview of the state of artificial intelligence, and his work at AI2, before fielding questions from me and members of the audience. Continue reading for highlights from the discussion, and stay tuned this fall for more information on how participating in this year's Geeks Give Back campaign. Todd Bishop: People look at artificial intelligence, and traditionally they think of a robot or a machine, but the internet is essentially the world brain.

It is not every day you see a runaway robot causing traffic chaos in a city centre - but in one Russian suburb is has happened twice in the last week. The robot, named Promobot, was being put through its paces at a research lab in the city of Perm in central Russia's Perm Krai region. In its first escape, the robot, designed to avoid obstacles and to turn around when it reached a boundary, had been left walking around an outside yard. This is the hilarious moment a runaway robot causes traffic chaos in a city centre. The robot - called Promobot - was being put through its paces at a research lab in the city of Perm in central Russia's Perm Krai region Promobot - short for Promotional Robot - is a unique robot created by Russian scientists and is designed to work in customer relations.

While data analytics, IoT, and AI are fast becoming normalized terms in the business world, it is generally perceived as reserved for the more adventurous companies, and not for the likes of conservative industries such as pharmaceuticals. This is certainly not the case anymore according to AstraZeneca's Steve Woodward who is leading the charge of data analytics within the pharma giant. Data is one of the areas which is defining the future of the business, mainly because of the vast amount of data which the company has. And this is only increasing at a faster and faster rate. For Woodward, a DevOps approach was crucial to increase the pace of development and production. The team is currently processing around 2,500 queries a minute, meaning the implementation of containers was a must.

Earlier this year I wrote about an interesting new start-up that's using machine learning to provide a more intuitive interface between customers and their banks. The platform utilizes machine learning to classify the transactions we make each month, and then provide intelligent insights into the patterns it observes. For instance, it might tell us how much we're spending at a particular coffee shop, or whether we might be able to save money on our utility bills. It seems part of an interesting trend towards more automated banking. Chatbots have been a hot topic in the news in recent months, and an Indian startup are using them to fully staff their mobile banking service.

Could machines become so intelligent and powerful they pose a threat to human life, or even humanity as a whole? It's a question that has become fashionable in some parts of Silicon Valley in recent years, despite being more or less irreconcilable with the simple robots and glitchy virtual assistants of today (see "AI Doomsayer Says His Ideas Are Catching On"). Some experts in artificial intelligence believe speculation about the dangers of future, super-intelligent software is harming the field. Now Google, a company heavily invested in artificial intelligence, is trying to carve out a middle way. A new paper released today describes five problems that researchers should investigate to help make future smart software safer.

The first generation of robo-advisors use a method known as "passive portfolio management" to buy and hold a fixed balance of exchange-traded funds. This method relies on price averages in order to match market returns. Vancouver-based online investment service Responsive aims to outperform this first generation of robo-advisors using a data-rich Artificial Intelligence approach. "Passive investing is a good start, but it ignores the data", Responsive CEO Davyde Wachell explains. Google's AlphaGo AI has been racking up wins against humanity's best Go players.

Artificial intelligence is still surrounded by an aura of mystery, and it would be tough to find a better illustration than the story in the news last week about a British grandmother who includes "please" and "thank you" in all her Google searches. "Please translate these roman numerals mcmxcviii thank you," read the search request from May Ashworth that ultimately went viral when her grandson tweeted it on Twitter. "I thought, well somebody's put it in, so you're thanking them," Ashworth reportedly explained. "I don't know how it works, to be honest. It's an endearing tale that drew notice from Google itself, but it also underscores the way A.I., in particular, has been something of a black box.

Registration has just opened up for an all new US 5 million XPrize, this time focusing on getting humans collaborating better with artificial intelligence to solve major global issues. Unlike previous competitions, this XPrize, sponsored by IBM's Watson division, doesn't feature a set of pre-determined goals, but instead challenges teams to come up with their own. You might be familiar with XPrize from its ongoing Google Lunar effort, which is seeing small teams from around the world compete to successfully land a robot on the Moon. It's a seriously ambitious project, and one that has seen rivals team up in the hope of winning out against the competition. This new project is totally different to the Lunar XPrize, but it's no less ambitious.

The magic and frustration of voice assistants and artificial intelligence when it comes to accessibility. A lot has been said recently about Apple's prospects in artificial intelligence and machine learning. One aspect of the discussion that I haven't seen considered is the accessibility ramifications of artificial intelligence in assistants like Siri. I've long been a proponent of voice-driven interfaces as assistive technology, which makes Siri's slow development all the more frustrating. This is particularly true when it comes to Siri understanding you if you have trouble speaking.

It's hard to think of a company more infatuated with AI than Google. With multi-billion dollar investments in deep learning startups like DeepMind, and responsible for some of the biggest advances involving neural networks, Google is the greatest cheerleader artificial intelligence could possibly hope for. But that doesn't mean there aren't things about AI that scare the search giant. Related: Google researchers have plans for an AI "kill switch" In a new paper, entitled "Concrete Problems in AI Safety," Google researchers -- alongside experts from UC Berkeley and Stanford University -- lay out some of the possible "negative side effects" which may arise from AI systems over the coming years. Instead of focusing on the distant threat of superintelligence, the 29-page paper instead examines "unintended and harmful behavior that may emerge from poor design."