In a book that's become the darling of many a Silicon Valley billionaire -- Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind -- the historian Yuval Harari paints a picture of humanity's inexorable march towards ever greater forms of collectivization. From the tribal clans of pre-history, people gathered to create city-states, then nations, and finally empires. While certain recent political trends, namely Brexit and the nativism of Donald Trump would seem to belie this trend, now another luminary of academia has added his voice to the chorus calling for stronger forms of world government. Far from citing some ancient historical trends though, Stephen Hawking points to artificial intelligence as a defining reason for needing stronger forms of globally enforced cooperation. It's facile to dismiss Stephen Hawking as another scientist poking his nose into problems more germane to politics than physics.

Let's first take the case made by the naysayers who claim we are a long time away from AI posing any real threat to humanity. These are often the same people who suggest Isaac Asimov's three laws of robotics are sufficient to ensure ethical behavior from machines – never mind that the whole thrust of Asimov's stories is to demonstrate how things can go terribly wrong despite of the three laws of robots. Leaving that aside, it's exceedingly difficult to keep pace with the breakneck pace of research in AI and robotics. One may be an expert in a small domain of AI or robotics, say pneumatic actuators, and have no clue what is going on in reinforcement learning. This tends to be the rule rather than the exception among experts, since their very expertise tends to confine them to a narrow field of endeavor.

March 9, 2017 --Physicist Stephen Hawking may be a proponent of artificial intelligence, but he has also been outspoken about the potential challenges it creates. In a recent interview, he sounded a similar tone, and offered a solution that conservatives may find hard to accept. Speaking to The Times of London to commemorate being awarded the Honorary Freedom of the City of London, a title that was conferred on him on Monday, Professor Hawking expressed optimism for the future. He added, however, that he is concerned about artificial intelligence (AI), as well as other global threats. "We need to be quicker to identify such threats and act before they get out of control," Hawking said.

March 9, 2017 --Physicist Stephen Hawking may be a proponent of artificial intelligence, but he has also been outspoken about the potential challenges it creates. In a recent interview, he sounded a similar tone, and offered a solution that conservatives my find hard to accept. Speaking to The Times of London to commemorate being awarded the Honorary Freedom of the City of London, a title that was conferred on him on Monday, Professor Hawking expressed optimism for the future. He added, however, that he is concerned about artificial intelligence (AI), as well as other global threats. "We need to be quicker to identify such threats and act before they get out of control," Hawking said.