It is, of course, wise and beneficial to peer ahead for potential dangers and problems -- one of the central tasks of high-end science fiction. Alas, detecting that a danger lurks is easier than prescribing solutions to prevent it. Take the plausibility of malignant Artificial Intelligence, remarked-upon recently by luminaries ranging from Stephen Hawking to Elon Musk to Francis Fukuyama (Our Post-Human Future: Consequences of the Biotechnology Revolution). Some warn that the arrival of sapient, or super- sapient machinery may bring an end to our species – or at least its relevance on the cosmic stage – a potentiality evoked in many a lurid Hollywood film. Nick Bostrom takes an in-depth look at the future of augmented human and a revolution in machine intelligence in his recent book -- Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies -- charting possible hazards, failure modes and spectacular benefits as machines match and then exceed our human levels of intelligence. Taking middle ground, SpaceX/Tesla entrepreneur Elon Musk has joined with Y-Combinator founder Sam Altman to establish Open AI, an endeavor that aims to keep artificial intelligence research – and its products – accountable by maximizing transparency and accountability.

That's what we were aiming for! For the first time, In Seattle, on May 20th, we decided to host a series of talks on the subject of Ethics in Machine Learning. As we mentioned in a KD Nuggets post last month, we've recently asked ourselves this: Can AI really ever be safe if it learns from us? Following our Quora question: "What constraints to AI and machine learning algorithms are needed to prevent AI from becoming a dystopian threat to humanity?" The winner of the contest, Igor Markov, went on to present his answer and plan at MLconf Seattle on 05/20.