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Commercial Space Tourism : Impediments to Industrial Development and Strategic Communication Solutions

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Commercial Space Tourism : Impediments to Industrial Development and Strategic Communication Solutions

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By: Gibson, Dirk C.
Publishing Info:  [Oak Park, Ill.] : Bentham Science Publishers. 2012

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Commercial Space Tourism : Impediments to Industrial Development and Strate...: EBSCOhost

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SpaceX will send Japanese billionaire Yusaku Maezawa to the Moon

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SpaceX will send Japanese billionaire Yusaku Maezawa to the Moon

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Loren Grush
September 17, 2018

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This evening, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk revealed that Yusaku Maezawa, a Japanese billionaire and founder of Zozotown, Japan's largest online clothing retailer, will be the first private customer to ride around the Moon on the company's future massive rocket, the Big Falcon Rocket (BFR). Maezawa plans to fly on the trip as early as 2023, and he wants to take artists with him to turn the entire ride into an art project called #dearMoon. A website for the mission went live after the announcement.

"Finally, I can tell you that I choose to go to the Moon! I choose to go to the moon with artists!" Maezawa said to announce his trip at a SpaceX event.

Maezawa, who is 42, reportedly has a current net worth of $2.9 billion, according to Forbes. He is also an avid art collector, and he spent $110.5 million on a 1982 painting by Jean-Michel Basquiat called Untitled last year. As an artist, he wants to invite other artists to come along with him on his ride. Maezawa says he has "bought all the seats" on the BFR and will be looking for others to join him on a week-long mission around the Moon.

"I would like to invite six to eight artists from around the world to join me on this mission to the Moon."

"I would like to invite six to eight artists from around the world to join me on this mission to the Moon," he said. "These artists will be asked to create something after they return to Earth, and these masterpieces will inspire the dreamer within all of us." Maezawa says he hasn't decided which artists he'd like to invite yet, but he would like them to represent many different fields, such as painters, musicians, film directors, and more.

Maezawa says he was inspired by imagining what his favorite artists would have created if they had traveled to space. "What if Picasso had gone to the Moon? Or Andy Warhol or Michael Jackson or John Lennon?" he asked at the event. "What about Coco Chanel? These are all artists that I adore."

Musk said that Maezawa actually came to SpaceX with the idea to do this flight. The billionaire declined to say how much he paid for the flight, but the trip will be free for the artists who go with him. Musk also noted that the down payment Maezawa made was significant enough that it will "have a material effect on paying for cost and development of BFR."

"He puts his money where his mouth is. He's legit."

"It makes a difference," Musk said. "He puts his money where his mouth is. He's legit." Musk also estimated that the development cost for BFR will be roughly $5 billion.

SpaceX hasn't decided on any specific type of training that Maezawa will do for the mission yet. "Nothing is written in stone," Maezawa said through a translator. "We are going to start discussion and decide here on forward."

This isn't the first time that SpaceX has announced plans to send a paying customer to the Moon on one of its vehicles. In February 2017, Musk proclaimed that two individuals had each put down a "significant deposit" to fly around the Moon on SpaceX's Falcon Heavy rocket, a larger version of the Falcon 9. No details about the passengers were given, though Musk said it was "nobody from Hollywood." The flight was slated to occur before the end of this year.

However, SpaceX ultimately decided to scrap the Falcon Heavy Moon mission. At the Falcon Heavy's inaugural launch in February, Musk said that SpaceX had decided to put people on the BFR instead. The BFR is the massive reusable rocket that SpaceX is developing to take people to the Moon and Mars. Maezawa was supposed to be one of the passengers on the Falcon Heavy flight. It's unclear what happened to the other passenger.

"Maybe I would join on this trip, I don't know."

Despite revealing this new passenger, SpaceX has yet to launch anyone to space. The company is working on it, though. Through NASA's Commercial Crew Program, SpaceX has been updating its Dragon cargo capsule to carry crew to and from the International Space Station. The plan, as of now, is to launch the vehicle, called Crew Dragon, for the first time on a test flight in December without passengers on board, according to Musk. That's a month later than the most recent dates announced by NASA. The company then hopes to fly the capsule with a two-person crew in the second quarter of 2019. Musk maintained that Commercial Crew is still the priority for SpaceX at the moment.

Meanwhile, Musk and Maezawa say that will continue to update the public with news about the Moon mission over the coming years. And Musk even left open the possibility that he would join the artist ride. "As far as me going, I'm not sure," he said. "Maybe I would join on this trip, I don't know." After some encouragement from Maezawa, Musk said he might consider it. "Yeah, maybe we will both be on it."

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SpaceX will send Japanese billionaire Yusaku Maezawa to the Moon

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This evening, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk revealed that Yusaku Maezawa, a Japanese billionaire and founder of Japan's largest online clothing retailer site Zozotown, will be the first private customer to ride around the Moon on the company's future massive rocket, the Big Falcon Rocket (BFR).

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By: Nicky Philips
Date: April 22, 2015

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Forget about designer babies—gene editing won’t work on complex traits like intelligence
3 Dec. 2015

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By: Ty McCormick
September - October 2013

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Dr. Prem  January 29, 2014

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By:  Paul Pangaro, Instructor
Source: George Washington University
Date: Sring of 1990

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Course Descripition - Artificial Intelligence and Cybernetics

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George Washington University Course ID Management 265 Department of Management Science Spring 1990 Paul Pangaro, Instructor [The following text and figure constituted a course description taught to approximately 25 students. Some colleagues upon hearing of this activity dubbed the course title, "AI versus Cybernetics."] Artificial Intelligence and Cybernetics: Aren't they the same thing?

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“Scientist dim sunlight, suck up carbon dioxide to cool the planet”

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“Scientist dim sunlight, suck up carbon dioxide to cool the planet”

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"Scientists dim sunlight, suck up carbon dioxide to cool planet." Reuters, 26 July 2017. Issues & Controversies, Infobase Learning, http://icof.infobaselearning.com/icofnewstopic.aspx?reutersID=354650. Accessed 19 Sept. 2018.

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Janssens, Cecile. "Forget about designer babies—gene editing won’t work on complex traits like intelligence." Opposing Viewpoints Online Collection, Gale, 2018. Opposing Viewpoints in Context, Originally published as "Forget about designer babies—gene editing won’t work on complex traits like intelligence," The Conversation, 3 Dec. 2015.

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Janssens, Cecile. "Forget about designer babies—gene editing won’t work on complex traits like intelligence." Opposing Viewpoints Online Collection, Gale, 2018. Opposing Viewpoints in Context, Originally published as "Forget about designer babies—gene editing won’t work on complex traits like intelligence," The Conversation, 3 Dec. 2015.

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By:Skylar Tibbits
https://youtu.be/0gMCZFHv9v8

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"Animal Cloning: A Risk Assessment"
1/8/2008
https://www.fda.gov/downloads/animalveterinary/safetyhealth/animalcloning/ucm124756.pdf

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Biotechnology and Genetic Engineering: Are biotechnology and genetic engineering positive advances?" Issues & Controversies, Infobase Learning, 15 Sept. 2014.

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Biotechnology and Genetic Engineering: Are biotechnology and genetic engineering positive advances?" Issues & Controversies, Infobase Learning, 15 Sept. 2014.

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Designer genes
Sept.-Oct. 2017

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"One category that is cloud brightening - where you try to add more vapor to the atmosphere, so the clouds turn whiter and reflect more sunlight." 

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"One category that is cloud brightening - where you try to add more vapor to the atmosphere, so the clouds turn whiter and reflect more sunlight." 

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Researching How to Fight Climate Change with Geoengineering
By: Weekend Edition Sunday
December 17, 2017

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4D printing: the time has come." Sydney Morning Herald [Sydney, Australia], 28 Sept. 2015, p. 8. Opposing Viewpoints in Context

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4D printing: the time has come." Sydney Morning Herald [Sydney, Australia], 28 Sept. 2015, p. 8. Opposing Viewpoints in Context

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4D printing, as the name suggests, refers to a 3D printed object with the fourth dimension - time - built in, where the final result can change form according to the specific conditions it finds itself in.

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"Ethics of Stem Cell Research Cartoon." Ethics, edited by Laurie DiMauro and Tina Grant, Greenhaven Press, 2010. Opposing Viewpoints. Opposing Viewpoints in Context, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/EJ2220002255/OVIC?u=j101913002&sid=OVIC&xid=9d81b4f7. Accessed 19 Sept. 2018.

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"Ethics of Stem Cell Research Cartoon." Ethics, edited by Laurie DiMauro and Tina Grant, Greenhaven Press, 2010. Opposing Viewpoints. Opposing Viewpoints in Context, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/EJ2220002255/OVIC?u=j101913002&sid=OVIC&xid=9d81b4f7. Accessed 19 Sept. 2018.

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"against"

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4D printing: processability and measurement of recovery force in shape memory polymers

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4D printing: processability and measurement of recovery force in shape memory polymers

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By:Monzón, M.
Paz, R.
Pei, E.
Ortega, F.
Suárez, L.
Ortega, Z.
Alemán, M.
Plucinski, T.
Clow, N.
March 2017

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Sign in with your credentials to access the EBSCOhost premium information resources provided by your subscribing institution.

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“Chemical sunshade to slow warming may not be feasible: U.N. draft“

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“Chemical sunshade to slow warming may not be feasible: U.N. draft“

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"Chemical sunshade to slow warming may not be feasible: U.N. draft." Reuters, 26 Jan. 2018. Issues & Controversies, Infobase Learning, http://icof.infobaselearning.com/icofnewstopic.aspx?reutersID=393006. Accessed 19 Sept. 2018.

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YT Video Explaining /what 4D Printing is

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YT Video Explaining /what 4D Printing is

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By: The B1M
https://youtu.be/MyK4BzbxcdU

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The Anticipated Futures of Space Tourism.

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The Anticipated Futures of Space Tourism.

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By: Johnson, Mark R.¹
Martin, Daryl2
Publication: Mobilities. Feb2016, Vol. 11 Issue 1, p135-151. 17p.

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The Anticipated Futures of Space Tourism: EBSCOhost

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Dreux, Lara. “Sci-Fi Borderline Ethical Issues: China First to Clone Monkeys.” IR Insider, IR Society at NYU, 28 Jan. 2018, www.irinsider.org/science-technology-1/2018/1/28/sci-fi-borderline-ethical-issues-china-first-to-clone-monkeys.

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Dreux, Lara. “Sci-Fi Borderline Ethical Issues: China First to Clone Monkeys.” IR Insider, IR Society at NYU, 28 Jan. 2018, www.irinsider.org/science-technology-1/2018/1/28/sci-fi-borderline-ethical-issues-china-first-to-clone-monkeys.

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https://www.irinsider.org/science-technology-1/2018/1/28/sci-fi-borderline-ethical-issues-china-first-to-clone-monkeys

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So You Want to Be a Space Tourist? Here Are Your Options

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So You Want to Be a Space Tourist? Here Are Your Options

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Adam Mann
July 21, 2017

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Though we've been living in the Space Age for more than half a century, going into space remains an extreme rarity. Fewer than 600 people have gone above the Kármán line - the point, about 62 miles above Earth, that marks the beginning of space - and all were put there by the U.S. or another nation's government.

But the rise of private spaceflight companies like Virgin Galactic and Space X means that the final frontier may soon be within reach of a great many more of us. The firms have announced plans to put private astronauts, a.k.a. space tourists, on orbital or suborbital flights within the next few years.

Initially, the cost of a ride on one of these rockets will be hundreds of thousands of dollars at a minimum. That puts the experience within reach of only the wealthiest people. But advances in rocket and capsule design are expected to lower the price to the point that people of more modest fortunes are able to afford a ticket.

Some projections put the global space tourism market at more than $34 billion by 2021.

What Space Tourists Can Expect

What exactly is in store for space tourists? The excitement of a rocket ride and a chance to experience weightlessness, for starters. And the bragging rights are hard to beat. But some say the biggest benefit of going into space is getting a dramatic new outlook on life on the fragile blue marble we call home. It's a perspective shift that could have profound implications not just for individuals but also for society at large.

"I personally believe the planetary perspective is going to be crucial to solving humanity's biggest challenges over the next century," says Virgin Galactic CEO George Whitesides. "I'm inspired that we'll take people up so they can experience that view, which is said to change your world view in a fundamental way."
Related: NASA Said No to My Astronaut Dream, So I Found Another Way
Billionaire computer engineer Charles Simonyi flew to the International Space Station aboard a Russian spacecraft with the assistance of a Vienna, Virginia-based firm called Space Adventures, and he echoes that sentiment. "It's great to go to space just because it's there," he says. "But I think space is our destiny and we will discover great benefits from it."

Flying High

Virgin Galactic plans to offer suborbital jaunts into space, with customers being treated to six minutes of weightlessness along with that one-of-a-kind view. The Las Cruces, New Mexico-based company says more than 600 customers have signed up, including Leonardo DiCaprio, Katy Perry, Ashton Kutcher, and superstar physicist Stephen Hawking. The price of a ticket stands at $250,000, with registration open for anyone who has that kind of extra cash on hand.

On June 1, Virgin successfully tested SpaceShipTwo Unity. The six-passenger spacecraft glided more than nine minutes to the ground after being released from an airplane flying at 50,000 feet. The company plans to make several more unpowered tests before allowing Unity's rocket engine to fire up so that, following its release from the plane, it can soar into space.

The company has been promising flights since unveiling SpaceShipTwo in 2009. But a series of bruising setbacks, including a 2014 crash that claimed a test pilot's life, extended the craft's test phase.

Virgin CEO Richard Branson said on July 5 that he hopes to see sp ace tourists flying on Virgin by the end of 2018. But other executives at the firm seem reluctant to commit to that. As Whitesides put it to NBC News MACH, "Once when we're at a place where we're comfortable with powered flights, we'll be ready to begin commercial operations."

Downs and Ups

Midland, Texas-based XCOR Aerospace sought to offer suborbital flights similar to those envisioned by Virgin Galactic. But in 2016, the company halted development of its space-plane, Lynx. On July 5, it announced that all remaining employees had been laid off but stopp ed short of saying it was out of business.
Related: Take a Tour of NASA's Full-Size Mockup of the International Space Station
Between 2001 and 2009, Space Adventures arranged for seven paying customers (including Charles Simonyi) to blast into space for a stint aboard the ISS. Each of these private astronauts got to the station aboard a Russian Soyuz capsule. Space Adventures has unspecified plans to send up more customers but can't now. Since the end of NASA's Space Shuttle program in 2011, all seats on Soyuz have been filled by American and Russian astronauts.

Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos has been eyeing the space tourist market with his private space company, Blue Origin. The company recently posted computer renderings of the opulent interior of its reusable New Shepard capsule configured with six plush leather chairs and six enormous windows.

Blue Origin has yet to say exactly when flights might begin or how much they would cost. Bezos said in March that he'd like to have his first customer flights next year. The company has a sign-up form for those interested in reserving a seat.

Of all companies offering, or expecting to offer, flights into space, SpaceX may have the most compelling story. Earlier this year, CEO Elon Musk announced that the company had accepted payment from two customers for a weeklong flight around the moon and back to Earth, largely retracing the path taken by Apollo 8 astronauts in 1968.

Musk has said that the mission could come as soon as 2018. Some are dubious, however, given SpaceX's reputation for offering overly optimistic schedules. How much the customers paid for the flight is unknown, but estimates have ranged from $80 million to $175 million per seat.

SpaceX has also announced the even more ambitious goal of sending colonists to Mars starting in 2025. Musk has said that once the company is able to build its massive 100-person Mars Colonial Transporter spacecraft, a trip to the Red Planet will cost about $500,000 - roughly the price of a middle-class house in California - with the goal of eventually bringing the price down to $100,000.

Almost Space

Tucson, Arizona-based World View Enterprises has announced plans to send passengers to an altitude of 100,000 feet in a luxury gondola suspended from a gigantic helium balloon. It's not quite space, but at that altitude, it's possible to see the blackness of space and the curvature of the earth. Eight customers would spend two hours ascending, two hours in cruise, and another hour or two returning to the ground.

Though lacking the cachet of true spaceflight, the World View flights promise a more refined experience; customers would be able to clink champagne glasses while taking in the view from enormous picture-frame windows and posting their photos to social media using onboard Wi-Fi.
Related: This Aspiring Astronaut Has Taken Some Dramatic Steps to Make His Dream Come True
World View says it hopes to begin manned testing in 2018 but offers no specific dates for the tourist flights. A ticket is projected to cost $75,000. The company's co-founder and chief technology officer, Taber MacCallum, says the target customer is "the Baby Boomer who's already bought their Ferrari and bought their third house and are looking for an experience to talk about and share."

Finally, there's Zero Gravity Corporation, an Arlington, Virginia-based company that already offers flights aboard a specially modified Boeing 727 that dives steeply to give paying passengers brief periods of weightlessness. As with the World View balloons flights, these parabolic flights aren't actually trips into space. But with a ticket for the experience running a relatively modest $5,000, it might be the cheapest way to get a sense of what it's like above the Kármán line.

Zero G flights take off weekly from airports across the U.S., including Orlando Sanford International near Orlando, Florida, McCarran International near Las Vegas, and Moffett Federal Airfield near San Francisco.
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So you want to be a space tourist? Here are your options

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Though we've been living in the Space Age for more than half a century, going into space remains an extreme rarity. Fewer than 600 people have gone above the Kármán line - the point, about 62 miles above Earth, that marks the beginning of space - and all were put there by the U.S.

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Omaththage P. Perera *, Nathan S. Little, Calvin A. Pierce

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Omaththage P. Perera *, Nathan S. Little, Calvin A. Pierce

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CRISPR/Cas9 mediated high efficiency knockout of the eye color gene Vermillion in Helicoverpa zea (Boddie)
May 17, 2018

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By: Future Of Life Institude

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Click here to see this page in other languages: Chinese French German Japanese Korean Russian

" Everything we love about civilization is a product of intelligence, so amplifying our human intelligence with artificial intelligence has the potential of helping civilization flourish like never before - as long as we manage to keep the technology beneficial."

Max Tegmark, President of the Future of Life Institute

What is AI?

From SIRI to self-driving cars, artificial intelligence (AI) is progressing rapidly. While science fiction often portrays AI as robots with human-like characteristics, AI can encompass anything from Google's search algorithms to IBM's Watson to autonomous weapons.

Artificial intelligence today is properly known as narrow AI (or weak AI), in that it is designed to perform a narrow task (e.g. only facial recognition or only internet searches or only driving a car). However, the long-term goal of many researchers is to create general AI (AGI or strong AI). While narrow AI may outperform humans at whatever its specific task is, like playing chess or solving equations, AGI would outperform humans at nearly every cognitive task.

Why research AI safety?

In the near term, the goal of keeping AI's impact on society beneficial motivates research in many areas, from economics and law to technical topics such as verification, validity, security and control. Whereas it may be little more than a minor nuisance if your laptop crashes or gets hacked, it becomes all the more important that an AI system does what you want it to do if it controls your car, your airplane, your pacemaker, your automated trading system or your power grid. Another short-term challenge is preventing a devastating arms race in lethal autonomous weapons.

In the long term, an important question is what will happen if the quest for strong AI succeeds and an AI system becomes better than humans at all cognitive tasks. As pointed out by I.J. Good in 1965, designing smarter AI systems is itself a cognitive task. Such a system could potentially undergo recursive self-improvement, triggering an intelligence explosion leaving human intellect far behind. By inventing revolutionary new technologies, such a superintelligence might help us eradicate war, disease, and poverty, and so the creation of strong AI might be the biggest event in human history. Some experts have expressed concern, though, that it might also be the last, unless we learn to align the goals of the AI with ours before it becomes superintelligent.

There are some who question whether strong AI will ever be achieved, and others who insist that the creation of superintelligent AI is guaranteed to be beneficial. At FLI we recognize both of these possibilities, but also recognize the potential for an artificial intelligence system to intentionally or unintentionally cause great harm. We believe research today will help us better prepare for and prevent such potentially negative consequences in the future, thus enjoying the benefits of AI while avoiding pitfalls.

How can AI be dangerous?

Most researchers agree that a superintelligent AI is unlikely to exhibit human emotions like love or hate, and that there is no reason to expect AI to become intentionally benevolent or malevolent. Instead, when considering how AI might become a risk, experts think two scenarios most likely:

1. The AI is programmed to do something devastating: Autonomous weapons are artificial intelligence systems that are programmed to kill. In the hands of the wrong person, these weapons could easily cause mass casualties. Moreover, an AI arms race could inadvertently lead to an AI war that also results in mass casualties. To avoid being thwarted by the enemy, these weapons would be designed to be extremely difficult to simply "turn off," so humans could plausibly lose control of such a situation. This risk is one that's present even with narrow AI, but grows as levels of AI intelligence and autonomy increase.

2. The AI is programmed to do something beneficial, but it develops a destructive method for achieving its goal: This can happen whenever we fail to fully align the AI's goals with ours, which is strikingly difficult. If you ask an obedient intelligent car to take you to the airport as fast as possible, it might get you there chased by helicopters and covered in vomit, doing not what you wanted but literally what you asked for. If a superintelligent system is tasked with a ambitious geoengineering project, it might wreak havoc with our ecosystem as a side effect, and view human attempts to stop it as a threat to be met.

As these examples illustrate, the concern about advanced AI isn't malevolence but competence. A super-intelligent AI will be extremely good at accomplishing its goals, and if those goals aren't aligned with ours, we have a problem. You're probably not an evil ant-hater who steps on ants out of malice, but if you're in charge of a hydroelectric green energy project and there's an anthill in the region to be flooded, too bad for the ants. A key goal of AI safety research is to never place humanity in the position of those ants.

Why the recent interest in AI safety

Stephen Hawking, Elon Musk, Steve Wozniak, Bill Gates, and many other big names in science and technology have recently expressed concern in the media and via open letters about the risks posed by AI, joined by many leading AI researchers. Why is the subject suddenly in the headlines?

The idea that the quest for strong AI would ultimately succeed was long thought of as science fiction, centuries or more away. However, thanks to recent breakthroughs, many AI milestones, which experts viewed as decades away merely five years ago, have now been reached, making many experts take seriously the possibility of superintelligence in our lifetime. While some experts still guess that human-level AI is centuries away, most AI researches at the 2015 Puerto Rico Conference guessed that it would happen before 2060. Since it may take decades to complete the required safety research, it is prudent to start it now.

Because AI has the potential to become more intelligent than any human, we have no surefire way of predicting how it will behave. We can't use past technological developments as much of a basis because we've never created anything that has the ability to, wittingly or unwittingly, outsmart us. The best example of what we could face may be our own evolution. People now control the planet, not because we're the strongest, fastest or biggest, but because we're the smartest. If we're no longer the smartest, are we assured to remain in control?

FLI's position is that our civilization will flourish as long as we win the race between the growing power of technology and the wisdom with which we manage it. In the case of AI technology, FLI's position is that the best way to win that race is not to impede the former, but to accelerate the latter, by supporting AI safety research.

The Top Myths About Advanced AI

A captivating conversation is taking place about the future of artificial intelligence and what it will/should mean for humanity. There are fascinating controversies where the world's leading experts disagree, such as: AI's future impact on the job market; if/when human-level AI will be developed; whether this will lead to an intelligence explosion; and whether this is something we should welcome or fear. But there are also many examples of of boring pseudo-controversies caused by people misunderstanding and talking past each other. To help ourselves focus on the interesting controversies and open questions -- and not on the misunderstandings -- let's clear up some of the most common myths.

Timeline Myths

The first myth regards the timeline: how long will it take until machines greatly supersede human-level intelligence? A common misconception is that we know the answer with great certainty.

One popular myth is that we know we'll get superhuman AI this century. In fact, history is full of technological over-hyping. Where are those fusion power plants and flying cars we were promised we'd have by now? AI has also been repeatedly over-hyped in the past, even by some of the founders of the field. For example, John McCarthy (who coined the term "artificial intelligence"), Marvin Minsky, Nathaniel Rochester and Claude Shannon wrote this overly optimistic forecast about what could be accomplished during two months with stone-age computers: "We propose that a 2 month, 10 man study of artificial intelligence be carried out during the summer of 1956 at Dartmouth College [...] An attempt will be made to find how to make machines use language, form abstractions and concepts, solve kinds of problems now reserved for humans, and improve themselves. We think that a significant advance can be made in one or more of these problems if a carefully selected group of scientists work on it together for a summer."

On the other hand, a popular counter-myth is that we know we won't get superhuman AI this century. Researchers have made a wide range of estimates for how far we are from superhuman AI, but we certainly can't say with great confidence that the probability is zero this century, given the dismal track record of such techno-skeptic predictions. For example, Ernest Rutherford, arguably the greatest nuclear physicist of his time, said in 1933 --- less than 24 hours before Szilard's invention of the nuclear chain reaction --- that nuclear energy was "moonshine.'' And Astronomer Royal Richard Woolley called interplanetary travel "utter bilge'' in 1956. The most extreme form of this myth is that superhuman AI will never arrive because it's physically impossible. However, physicists know that a brain consists of quarks and electrons arranged to act as a powerful computer, and that there's no law of physics preventing us from building even more intelligent quark blobs.

There have been a number of surveys asking AI researchers how many years from now they think we'll have human-level AI with at least 50% probability. All these surveys have the same conclusion: the world's leading experts disagree, so we simply don't know. For example, in such a poll of the AI researchers at the 2015 Puerto Rico AI conference, the average (median) answer was by year 2045, but some researchers guessed hundreds of years or more.

There's also a related myth that people who worry about AI think it's only a few years away. In fact, most people on record worrying about superhuman AI guess it's still at least decades away. But they argue that as long as we're not 100% sure that it won't happen this century, it's smart to start safety research now to prepare for the eventuality. Many of the safety problems associated with human-level AI are so hard that they may take decades to solve. So it's prudent to start researching them now rather than the night before some programmers drinking Red Bull decide to switch one on.

Controversy Myths

Another common misconception is that the only people harboring concerns about AI and advocating AI safety research are luddites who don't know much about AI. When Stuart Russell, author of the standard AI textbook, mentioned this during his Puerto Rico talk, the audience laughed loudly. A related misconception is that supporting AI safety research is hugely controversial. In fact, to support a modest investment in AI safety research, people don't need to be convinced that risks are high, merely non-negligible -- just as a modest investment in home insurance is justified by a non-negligible probability of the home burning down.

It may be that media have made the AI safety debate seem more controversial than it really is. After all, fear sells, and articles using out-of-context quotes to proclaim imminent doom can generate more clicks than nuanced and balanced ones. As a result, two people who only know about each other's positions from media quotes are likely to think they disagree more than they really do. For example, a techno-skeptic who only read about Bill Gates's position in a British tabloid may mistakenly think Gates believes superintelligence to be imminent. Similarly, someone in the beneficial-AI movement who knows nothing about Andrew Ng's position except his quote about overpopulation on Mars may mistakenly think he doesn't care about AI safety, whereas in fact, he does. The crux is simply that because Ng's timeline estimates are longer, he naturally tends to prioritize short-term AI challenges over long-term ones.

Myths About the Risks of Superhuman AI

Many AI researchers roll their eyes when seeing this headline: " Stephen Hawking warns that rise of robots may be disastrous for mankind." And as many have lost count of how many similar articles they've seen. Typically, these articles are accompanied by an evil-looking robot carrying a weapon, and they suggest we should worry about robots rising up and killing us because they've become conscious and/or evil. On a lighter note, such articles are actually rather impressive, because they succinctly summarize the scenario that AI researchers don't worry about. That scenario combines as many as three separate misconceptions: concern about consciousness, evil, and robots.

If you drive down the road, you have a subjective experience of colors, sounds, etc. But does a self-driving car have a subjective experience? Does it feel like anything at all to be a self-driving car? Although this mystery of consciousness is interesting in its own right, it's irrelevant to AI risk. If you get struck by a driverless car, it makes no difference to you whether it subjectively feels conscious. In the same way, what will affect us humans is what superintelligent AI does, not how it subjectively feels.

The fear of machines turning evil is another red herring. The real worry isn't malevolence, but competence. A superintelligent AI is by definition very good at attaining its goals, whatever they may be, so we need to ensure that its goals are aligned with ours. Humans don't generally hate ants, but we're more intelligent than they are - so if we want to build a hydroelectric dam and there's an anthill there, too bad for the ants. The beneficial-AI movement wants to avoid placing humanity in the position of those ants.

The consciousness misconception is related to the myth that machines can't have goals. Machines can obviously have goals in the narrow sense of exhibiting goal-oriented behavior: the behavior of a heat-seeking missile is most economically explained as a goal to hit a target. If you feel threatened by a machine whose goals are misaligned with yours, then it is precisely its goals in this narrow sense that troubles you, not whether the machine is conscious and experiences a sense of purpose. If that heat-seeking missile were chasing you, you probably wouldn't exclaim: "I'm not worried, because machines can't have goals!"

I sympathize with Rodney Brooks and other robotics pioneers who feel unfairly demonized by scaremongering tabloids, because some journalists seem obsessively fixated on robots and adorn many of their articles with evil-looking metal monsters with red shiny eyes. In fact, the main concern of the beneficial-AI movement isn't with robots but with intelligence itself: specifically, intelligence whose goals are misaligned with ours. To cause us trouble, such misaligned superhuman intelligence needs no robotic body, merely an internet connection - this may enable outsmarting financial markets, out-inventing human researchers, out-manipulating human leaders, and developing weapons we cannot even understand. Even if building robots were physically impossible, a super-intelligent and super-wealthy AI could easily pay or manipulate many humans to unwittingly do its bidding.

The robot misconception is related to the myth that machines can't control humans. Intelligence enables control: humans control tigers not because we are stronger, but because we are smarter. This means that if we cede our position as smartest on our planet, it's possible that we might also cede control.

The Interesting Controversies

Not wasting time on the above-mentioned misconceptions lets us focus on true and interesting controversies where even the experts disagree. What sort of future do you want? Should we develop lethal autonomous weapons? What would you like to happen with job automation? What career advice would you give today's kids? Do you prefer new jobs replacing the old ones, or a jobless society where everyone enjoys a life of leisure and machine-produced wealth? Further down the road, would you like us to create superintelligent life and spread it through our cosmos? Will we control intelligent machines or will they control us? Will intelligent machines replace us, coexist with us, or merge with us? What will it mean to be human in the age of artificial intelligence? What would you like it to mean, and how can we make the future be that way? Please join the conversation!

Recommended References

Many of the organizations listed on this page and their descriptions are from a list compiled by the Global Catastrophic Risk institute; we are most grateful for the efforts that they have put into compiling it. These organizations above all work on computer technology issues, though many cover other topics as well. This list is undoubtedly incomplete; please contact us to suggest additions or corrections.

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Benefits & Risks of Artificial Intelligence - Future of Life Institute

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What are the benefits and risks of artificial intelligence (AI)? Why do we need research to ensure that AI remains safe and beneficial?

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https://youtu.be/4YKFw2KZA5o

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Hansen. “Embryonic Stem Cell Production through Therapeutic Cloning Has Fewer Ethical Problems than Stem Cell Harvest from Surplus IVF Embryos .” Journal of Biomedical Ethics, BMJ Journals, 1 Apr. 2002, jme.bmj.com/content/28/2/86.

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Hansen. “Embryonic Stem Cell Production through Therapeutic Cloning Has Fewer Ethical Problems than Stem Cell Harvest from Surplus IVF Embryos .” Journal of Biomedical Ethics, BMJ Journals, 1 Apr. 2002, jme.bmj.com/content/28/2/86.

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https://jme.bmj.com/content/28/2/86

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Global Weirding is produced by KTTZ Texas Tech Public Media and distributed by PBS Digital Studios. Brought to you in part by: Bob and Linda Herscher, Freese and Nichols, Inc, and the Texas Tech Climate Science Center.

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The Economist gives an over view on space tourism and how close it may be.

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By: Paul Pangaro
Date: May 8, 2012

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As a way of perceiving the world, artificial intelligence is lacking.  Cybernetics offers a more humanistic approach to technology and interaction.  View next: "What is cybernetics?"

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Touchstone: A Journal of Mere Christianity

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Touchstone: A Journal of Mere Christianity

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December 1, 2008

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Britain's Embryo Bill Passes Commons.: EBSCOhost

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https://www.computerworld.com/article/3071666/3d-printing/how-4d-printing-is-now-saving-lives.html

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The Future of Artificial Intelligence and Cybernectics

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The Future of Artificial Intelligence and Cybernectics

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By: Kevin Warwick
Source: MIT Technology review
Date: November 10, 2016

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Science fiction has, for many years, looked to a future in which robots are intelligent and cyborgs are commonplace. The Terminator, The Matrix, Blade Runner and I, Robot are all good examples of this vision.

But until the last decade, consideration of what this might actually mean in the future was unnecessary because it was all science fiction, not scientific reality. Now, however, science has not only done some catching up; it's also introduced practicalities that the original story lines didn't appear to include (and, in some cases, still don't include).

What we consider here are several different experiments linking biology and technology together in a cybernetic way-essentially ultimately combining humans and machines in a relatively permanent merger.

When we typically first think of a robot, we regard it simply as a machine. We tend to think that it might be operated remotely by a human, or that it may be controlled by a simple computer program.

But what if the robot has a biological brain made up of brain cells, possibly even human neurons? Neurons grown under laboratory conditions on an array of non-invasive electrodes provide an attractive alternative with which to realize a new form of robot controller. In the near future, we will see thinking robots with brains not very dissimilar to those of humans.

That development will raise many social and ethical questions. For example, if the robot brain has roughly the same number of human neurons as a typical human brain, then could it, or should it, have rights similar to those of a person? Also, if such robots have far more human neurons than in a typical human brain-for example, a million times more neurons-would they, rather than humans, make all future decisions?

Many human brain-computer interfaces are used for therapeutic purposes to overcome medical or neurological problems, with one example being the deep brain stimulation (DBS) electrodes used to relieve the symptoms of Parkinson's disease. However, even here it's possible to consider using such technology in ways that would give people abilities that humans don't normally possess-in other words, human enhancement. In some cases, those who have undergone amputations or suffered spinal injuries due to accidents may be able to regain control of devices via their still-functioning neural signals.

Meanwhile, stroke patients can be given limited control of their surroundings, as indeed can those who have motor neurone disease. With those cases, the situation isn't straightforward, as patients receive abilities that normal humans don't have-for example, the ability to move a cursor on a computer screen using nothing but neural signals.

It's clear that connecting a human brain with a computer network via an implant could, in the long term, open up the distinct advantages of machine intelligence, communication, and sensing abilities to the individual receiving the implant. Currently, obtaining the go-ahead for each implantation requires ethical approval from the local authority governing the hospital where the procedure is performed. But looking ahead, it's quite possible that commercial influences, coupled with societal wishes to communicate more effectively and perceive the world in a richer form, will drive market desire.

For some, brain-computer interfaces are perhaps a step too far just now-particularly if the approach means tampering directly with the brain. As a result, the most studied brain-computer interface to date is that involving electroencephalography (EEG). While EEG experimentation is relatively cheap, portable, and easy to set up, it's still difficult to see its widespread future use. It certainly has a role to play in externally assessing some aspects of brain functioning for medical purposes. However, the idea of people driving around while wearing skullcap of electrodes, with no need for a steering wheel, doesn't seem realistic. Completely autonomous vehicles are much more likely.

Such experimental cases indicate how humans-and animals, for that matter-can merge with technology. That, in turn, generates a plethora of social and ethical considerations as well as technical issues. That's why it's vital to include a sense of reflection so that the additional experimentation we'll now witness will be guided by the informed feedback that results.

This article is excerpted from a lengthier exploration of AI and cybernetics. Read the full article on Kevin Warwick is deputy vice chancellor for research at Coventry University in the United Kingdom. He is former professor of cybernetics at Reading University, also in the U.K. He is the author or co-author of more than 600 research papers. BBVA's OpenMind site.

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The Future of Artificial Intelligence and Cybernetics

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Science fiction has, for many years, looked to a future in which robots are intelligent and cyborgs are commonplace. The Terminator, The Matrix, Blade Runner and I, Robot are all good examples of this vision. But until the last decade, consideration of what this might actually mean in the future was unnecessary because it was all science fiction, not scientific reality.