Why an AI takeover may not be a bad thing

For years now, some of the smartest and most influential people on Earth have been warning about the dangers of artificial intelligence, laying out nightmarish scenarios that sound like they were pulled from the pages of a Hollywood script. Stephen Hawking, the renowned theoretical physicist, has given humanity a tight deadline for escaping the planet. Disease-fighting business magnate Bill Gates, meanwhile, has said he doesn't understand why "some people are not concerned" about the threat posed by super-intelligent machines. However, Kevin Kelly, the executive editor of Wired magazine, is offering a decidedly optimistic answer to Gates's question. Contrasting humans with technology ignores something that has been true for the past 10,000 years or so -- something there's no coming back from, Kelly told a reporter at the World Government Summit in Dubai earlier this month.