Tech must look to past to protect the future from an artificial intelligence apocalypse

Through a joint alliance on artificial intelligence, five tech giants need to take a better look at the guidelines established by one of the most influential writers of modern science fiction to protect us from an apocalyptic future. Fears of what autonomous technologies are capable of is entirely understandable, even though artificial intelligence is still in early stages. IBM, -0.11% and Microsoft Corp. MSFT, -1.09% have created an ethics-focused nonprofit that says it has goals such as educating the public, protecting the privacy and security of individuals, and to create a forum for discussion of the complex issues in a future with machines may be in decision-making roles. The Partnership on AIproposed a set of eight tenets to ensure that the use of AI is "beneficial to people and society." But the corporate-sounding tenets seem to be a trumped-up, yet still watered-down, version of the three fundamental "Rules of Robotics," as written by legendary science fiction author Isaac Asimov.