Does AI pose a threat to society?

"Scientists fear revolt of killer robots." When he read that headline in a Sunday newspaper Alan Winfield, Professor of Robot Ethics at the Bristol Laboratory, was surprised to say the least. Speaking at a British Academy debate in Bristol on 1st March entitled "Does AI pose a threat to society?", Winfield said he had told the journalist who wrote the story that a discussion about robot ethics had been "rather dull--a case of scientists behaving responsibly." Winfield spent the next two days explaining that scientists are not especially exercised by killer robots. The issue was not merely media sensationalism. "Of course, robotics and intelligent systems must be engineered to high standards of safety, for exactly the same reasons that we need our washing machines, our cars, and our aeroplanes to be safe.