The rapid advancement of artificial intelligence is shaping the future of technology.
On May 30, a research organization called the Center for AI Safety released a 22-word statement signed by a number of prominent "AI scientists," including Sam Altman, the CEO of OpenAI; Demis Hassabis, the CEO of Google DeepMind; and Geoffrey Hinton, who has been described as the "godfather" of AI. …
Philip K. Dick had some strange ideas about the future. In his 40-plus novels and 121 short stories, the science fiction author imagined everything from "mood organs" which allow users to dial up an emotional state including "the desire to watch TV, no matter what's on" to pay-per-use doors that …
The artificial intelligence world faced a swarm of stinging backlash Tuesday morning, after more than 350 tech executives and researchers released a public statement declaring that the risks of runaway AI could be on par with those of "nuclear war" and human "extinction." Among the signatories were …
I'll admit it. In the first couple days after using ChatGPT, the advanced chatbot from OpenAI, I felt the same way I did when I first downloaded the Mosaic Web Browser in the early '90s. The earth seemed like it had shifted below my feet. I write about the history of technology, so you'd think I'd …
Earlier this month, United States Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy released an advisory calling attention to the public health crisis of loneliness. Loneliness, Murthy warned, is more than just a feeling of being alone. It can adversely affect mental, physical and emotional health. If a person is …
Artificial intelligence is advancing at a breakneck pace. Earlier this month, one of the world's most famous AI researchers, Geoffrey Hinton, left his job at Google to warn us of the existential threat it poses. Executives of the leading AI companies are making the rounds in Washington to meet with …
While the conversations they produce may seem astounding, ChatGPT, Bard and other contemporary "AI" chatbots are not magic. Rather, they are merely examples of what computer scientists call "large language models," or LLMs. Essentially, LLMs are trained to identify likely sequences of words, then …
The printing press is surely near the top of any list of the greatest inventions of all time. Before the printing press, books were transcribed by hand, and innovations were spread by explorers and adventurers like Marco Polo who traveled the Silk Road to Asia and returned to Europe with news of …
To borrow an old cliché, ChatGPT-4 broke the internet. The latest iteration of artificial intelligence research lab OpenAI's most advanced AI chatbot was released on March 14, immediately generating considerable hype around a technology that draws equal parts techno-utopianism or robot apocalypse. …
