Michael Kanaan, AI and machine learning in suicide prevention … He is currently the director of operations for Air Force / MIT artificial intelligence.

How would you describe what Artificial Intelligence is? Michael: When we talk about AI, some people tend to imagine the Terminator. For others, it might be Baymax from "Big Hero 6", "WALL-E", or Hal from "2001: A Space Odyssey". What those examples all have in common is the assumption that AI is unavoidably destined (sooner or later) to develop it's own consciousness and autonomous, evil intent. But when it comes to these portrayals of AI, too often they generate an array of fears by focusing our attention on distant and somewhat dystopian possibilities, rather than the present day realities. They usually depict AI as an alignment of computer intelligence with consciousness, but then frighten us by portraying a world where it's not only conscious, but also evil minded and self-motivated to overtake and destroy us. However, I think it's better to talk about AI in a little bit of a different way.