Mission-Driven Artificial Intelligence and the Common Good

Humanity is now developing our greatest contribution to the expansion of intelligence on the planet: the flowering of artificial intelligence. It would be a shame if all we used it for were Amazon shopping and Facebook birthday reminders. Universities, companies, nonprofits, and governmental agencies are already busy developing interesting tools and applications that direct machine learning toward the common good. Though still in their early days, these initiatives just may represent our best bet for addressing our most challenging ecological and societal problems. Welcome to the world of "Mission-Driven AI." Being mission-driven is not the same thing as having a mission statement.