Thinking Machines Lab, an artificial intelligence company founded by top researchers who fled OpenAI, has raised a record 2 billion seed round that values the fledgling firm at 12 billion. The funding round was led by Andreessen Horowitz and included Nvidia, Accel, Cisco, and AMD--among others. The mammoth investment reflects the ultracompetitive race to build advanced AI systems, as well as the premium placed on top AI talent. It is the largest seed funding round in history. Thinking Machines is led by CEO Mira Murati, who stepped down as OpenAI's chief technology officer last September.

Many tech experts have warned that AI is on a path of destruction, but a new survey of top researchers has quantified the chances of it causing human extinction. A team of international scientists asked 2,778 AI experts about the future of the systems, with five percent reporting the tech will lead to collapse. But, a far more frightening estimation came from one in 10 researchers who said there's a shocking 25 percent chance that AI will destroy the human race. The experts cited three possible causes: AI allowing threatening groups to make powerful tools, like engineered viruses, 'authoritarian rulers using AI to control their populations and AI systems worsening economic inequality by disproportionately benefiting certain individuals.' Artificial intelligence regulation control is the only answer to protecting humans, and if AI isn't regulated, researchers estimated that there is a 10 percent chance that machines will outperform humans in all tasks by 2027, - but it would increase to a 50 percent chance by 2047.

OpenAI's top researcher has made a startling claim this week: that artificial intelligence may already be gaining consciousness. Ilya Sutskever, chief scientist of the OpenAI research group, tweeted today that "it may be that today's large neural networks are slightly conscious." Needless to say, that's an unusual point of view. The widely accepted idea among AI researchers is that the tech has made great strides over the past decade, but still falls far short of human intelligence, nevermind being anywhere close to experiencing the world consciously. It's possible that Sutskever was speaking facetiously, but it's also conceivable that as the top researcher at one of the foremost AI groups in the world, he's already looking downrange.

OpenAI's top researcher has made a startling claim this week: that artificial intelligence may already be gaining consciousness. Ilya Sutskever, chief scientist of the OpenAI research group, tweeted today that "it may be that today's large neural networks are slightly conscious." Needless to say, that's an unusual point of view. The widely accepted idea among AI researchers is that the tech has made great strides over the past decade, but still falls far short of human intelligence, nevermind being anywhere close to experiencing the world consciously. It's possible that Sutskever was speaking facetiously, but it's also conceivable that as the top researcher at one of the foremost AI groups in the world, he's already looking downrange. He's long been preoccupied with artificial general intelligence, or AGI, which would refer to AI that operates at a human or superhuman level.

Google has fired one of its top artificial intelligence researchers, Margaret Mitchell, escalating internal turmoil at the company following the departure of Timnit Gebru, another leading figure on Google's AI ethics team. Mitchell, who announced her firing on Twitter, did not immediately respond to requests for comment. In a statement to Reuters, Google said the firing followed a weeks-long investigation that found she moved electronic files outside the company. Google said Mitchell violated the company's code of conduct and security policies. Google's ethics in artificial intelligence research unit has been under scrutiny since December's dismissal of Gebru, a prominent Black researcher in Silicon Valley.

The Fourth Industrial Revolution was introduced in a 2015 article published in Foreign Affairs by Klaus Schwab, Executive Chairman of the World Economic Forum. The Fourth Industrial Revolution outlines the fundamental changes in the way we work, live, and interact due to technological advancement. This industrial revolution is influencing all disciplines, industries, and economics and creating a huge impact in a non-linear way at an unrivalled speed. Blockchain, Cloud, IoT, and AI are leading the way towards the Fourth Industrial revolution. Although, blockchain and AI have their own ideals to accomplish; You may be asking yourself the question, "What is Blockchain" or "What is AI"?

Recently, in cognizance of this seismic shift, the world's top AI researchers met in Asilomar, California to deliberate on AI principles and goals. In doing so, this eminent artificial intelligence society gifted humanity a framework of how to own the future. It is only by navigating AI ethical dilemmas, that we will avail the life saving technologies of applied artificial intelligence. The EU in its Responsible Research and Innovation initiative calls for investment in legal, social and ethics [LSE] research. Investment in LSE research will generate knowledge that can match artificial intelligence goals and society's needs.

Artificial intelligence is already beginning to spiral out of our control, a new report from top researchers warns. Not so much in a Skynet kind of sense, but more in a'technology companies and governments are already using AI in ways that amp up surveillance and further marginalize vulnerable populations' kind of way. On Thursday, the AI Now Institute, which is affiliated with New York University and is home to top AI researchers with Google and Microsoft, released a report detailing, essentially, the state of AI in 2018, and the raft of disconcerting trends unfolding in the field. What we broadly define as AI--machine learning, automated systems, etc.--is currently being developed faster than our regulatory system is prepared to handle, the report says. And it threatens to consolidate power in the tech companies and oppressive governments that deploy AI while rendering just about everyone else more vulnerable to its biases, capacities for surveillance, and myriad dysfunctions.

Artificial intelligence is already beginning to spiral out of our control, a new report from top researchers warns. Not so much in a Skynet kind of sense, but more in a'technology companies and governments are already using AI in ways that amp up surveillance and further marginalize vulnerable populations' kind of way. On Thursday, the AI Now Institute, which is affiliated with New York University and is home to top AI researchers with Google and Microsoft, released a report detailing, essentially, the state of AI in 2018, and the raft of disconcerting trends unfolding in the field. What we broadly define as AI--machine learning, automated systems, etc.--is currently being developed faster than our regulatory system is prepared to handle, the report says. And it threatens to consolidate power in the tech companies and oppressive governments that deploy AI while rendering just about everyone else more vulnerable to its biases, capacities for surveillance, and myriad dysfunctions.

At the heart of the discipline of artificial intelligence is the idea that one day we'll be able to build a machine that's as smart as a human. Such a system is often referred to as an artificial general intelligence, or AGI, which is a name that distinguishes the concept from the broader field of study. It also makes it clear that true AI possesses intelligence that is both broad and adaptable. To date, we've built countless systems that are superhuman at specific tasks, but none that can match a rat when it comes to general brain power. But despite the centrality of this idea to the field of AI, there's little agreement among researchers as to when this feat might actually be achievable.