But Peter Scott-Morgan has never been afraid of robots. As a scientist and roboticist by trade, he spent decades researching how artificial intelligence (AI) might transform our lives. Then, in 2017, Dr Scott-Morgan was diagnosed with motor neuron disease, the same paralysing condition that killed Stephen Hawking. Months after puzzling over his "wonky foot" falling asleep, he was told he had two years to live. To survive, he would turn to the technology he had spent his career researching.

A new book by Conflict Analytics project member Jacob Turner is delving into some of the key issues surrounding AI. Published by Palgrave, Robot Rules argues that AI's ability to make independent decisions makes it unique – and unpredictable. "In Robot Rules: Regulating Artificial Intelligence, I explore what makes AI unique, what legal and ethical problems this will cause, and how we can solve them," Turner says. Turner lays out three issues: the responsibility for harm caused by AI, the rights surrounding'legal personality' for AI, and the ethics behind an AI decision-making process. Robot Rules suggests that in order to address these questions we need to develop new institutions and regulations on a cross-industry and international level.

Artificial intelligence keeps barreling forward, and of all the sectors it will likely impact, we ought to think through autonomous vehicles, criminal justice and the media sooner than later. Those are the first three areas that a new AI-centered philanthropic fund is engaging first. The fund formed early this year with a $27 million pool of donations from the Knight and Hewlett foundations, Reid Hoffman, the Omidyar Network, and investor Jim Pallotta. Now it's announced its first round of payouts. The main grantees won't be a surprise, as the Berkman Klein Center at Harvard and the MIT Media Lab are the anchor institutions, and will share $5.9 million.

A world where robots do all the testing seems a long way off. For starters, demand isn't there, said Diego Lo Giudice, an analyst and vice president at Forrester Research. Lots of platform makers are adding AI to software testing, but Lo Giudice isn't getting many calls from clients about this. From what he sees, Sypolt's experience is typical. "Once they try it, they like it and are interested in it," he said.

Artificial Intelligence – Neil Jacobstein recently gave an information-packed talk at the Exponential Manufacturing conference on how artificial intelligence is redefining the future of work, production, supply chain, and design. Singularity University recently held the Exponential Manufacturing Summit with some of the world's brightest executives, entrepreneurs and investors being led through an intensive three-day program in Boston to prepare them for the changes brought forth by unstoppable technological progress. See the full lecture below. At the Summit, Neil Jacobstein chairs the Artificial Intelligence and Robotics Track at Singularity University, explored how exponential technologies including artificial intelligence, additive manufacturing, exponential energy, and bio manufacturing are continually redefining the future of work, production, supply chain, and design. "What you'll see when you look behind the scenes of most AI startups and even research labs is an emerging symbiosis between human intelligence and machine intelligence."

The 2012 publication Race against the Machine makes the case that the digitalization of work activities is proceeding so rapidly as to cause dislocations in the job market beyond anything previously experienced [1]. Unlike past mechanization/automation, which affected lower-skill blue-collar and white-collar work, today's information technology affects workers high in the education and skill distribution. Machines can substitute for brains as well as brawn. On one estimate, about 47% of total US employment is at risk of computerization [2]. If you doubt whether a robot or some other machine equipped with digital intelligence connected to the internet could outdo you or me in our work in the foreseeable future, consider news reports about an IBM program to "create" new food dishes (chefs beware), the battle between anesthesiologists and computer programs/robots that do their job much cheaper, and the coming version of Watson ("twice as powerful as the original") based on computers connected over the internet via IBM's Cloud [3]. On the darker side, you do not have to be paranoid to be paranoid about the potential technologies that the super-secret computers of the US National Security Agency (NSA) have on their digital drawing-boards.

The 2012 publication Race against the Machine makes the case that the digitalization of work activities is proceeding so rapidly as to cause dislocations in the job market beyond anything previously experienced [1]. Unlike past mechanization/automation, which affected lower-skill blue-collar and white-collar work, today's information technology affects workers high in the education and skill distribution. Machines can substitute for brains as well as brawn. On one estimate, about 47% of total US employment is at risk of computerization [2]. If you doubt whether a robot or some other machine equipped with digital intelligence connected to the internet could outdo you or me in our work in the foreseeable future, consider news reports about an IBM program to "create" new food dishes (chefs beware), the battle between anesthesiologists and computer programs/robots that do their job much cheaper, and the coming version of Watson ("twice as powerful as the original") based on computers connected over the internet via IBM's Cloud [3]. On the darker side, you do not have to be paranoid to be paranoid about the potential technologies that the super-secret computers of the US National Security Agency (NSA) have on their digital drawing-boards.

I am at the Recession Generation unconference. Robin Hanson is speaking on his new book - The Age of Em: Work, Love and Life when Robots Rule the Earth Robin is talking about a world where human Brain emulation works. What would be needed Massive computers Superhigh resolution scan of the brain Model each cell types in the brain Robin will avoid arguing about whether it can happen, how it will happen etc.. He will focus on what happens if it happens. What is and not what should be.

In the future, or so some people think, it will become possible to upload your consciousness into a computer. Software emulations of human brains – ems, for short – will then take over the economy and world. This sort of thing happens quite a lot in science fiction, but The Age of Em is a fanatically serious attempt, by an economist and scholar at Oxford's Future of Humanity Institute, to use economic and social science to forecast in fine detail how this world (if it is even possible) will actually work. The future it portrays is very strange and, in the end, quite horrific for everyone involved. It is an eschatological vision worthy of Hieronymus Bosch.

Brooklyn Futurist Meetup at Brooklyn Law School - Jan 6 2016 At our first meetup of 2016 Robin Hanson previewed The Age of Em - his upcoming book and research unveil a world run by robots. Not a science fiction novel, he envisions every aspect of our lives influenced by the spread of robots from the workplace and life extension to personal relationships. His insights on employment challenges are especially noteworthy.