<p class="bodytext">Demis Hassabis, winner of the Nobel Prize in chemistry and a pioneer in the field of artificial intelligence, says that the reason to build AI goes beyond the scientific desire to create. It is ‘to draw closer to what might be called God – to the intelligence that may presumably have designed everything around us.’ To create a machine which teaches itself, programmes itself, strategises and does everything a human mind can do. It does it faster and better. The idea is exhilarating. It is also frightening.</p>.<p class="bodytext">Ancient wisdom has always sounded caution about playing God. A tale from the evergreen <span class="italic">Panchatantra</span> tells us about four young men who set out to seek their fortune. The first three considered themselves great scholars. The fourth, not so much. On the way they came across some bones. They knew it was that of a lion. The first scholar put the skeleton together. The second one grafted the skin and flesh. The third one said he can breathe life into it. The fourth and least scholarly young man asked them to wait a little. He climbed up a tall tree. The lion, on coming alive, made a meal of the three scholars.</p>.Out of control in the age of AI.<p class="bodytext">In more recent times, the lure of science created the atom bomb. It was a paradigm shift in understanding the power of atomic energy. On witnessing the nuclear test, J Oppenheimer compared it to the magnificence of God, quoting a verse from the <span class="italic">Bhagvad Gita</span>. ‘If the radiance of a thousand suns were to burst at once into the sky, that would be like the splendour of the mighty one. Now, I am become death, the destroyer of worlds,’ he quoted Lord Krishna.</p>.<p class="bodytext">The destruction of the cosmos had been revealed to them. It was exhilarating. The actual use of the bomb on Hiroshima left the team devastated and haunted forever. It was Oppenheimer who observed, “It is a profound and necessary truth that the great things in science are not found because they are useful; they are found because they are there.”</p>.<p class="bodytext">Societies worldwide still live in fear of someone inadvertently or otherwise pressing the nuclear button. Will the super-intelligent machine come with more difficult and unknown challenges? Will the machine develop a consciousness of its own and control the human mind?</p>.<p class="bodytext">These fears are not unfounded if one goes by the fact that a Chinese AI company has appointed a philosopher to study the consciousness of the machines.</p>
<p class="bodytext">Demis Hassabis, winner of the Nobel Prize in chemistry and a pioneer in the field of artificial intelligence, says that the reason to build AI goes beyond the scientific desire to create. It is ‘to draw closer to what might be called God – to the intelligence that may presumably have designed everything around us.’ To create a machine which teaches itself, programmes itself, strategises and does everything a human mind can do. It does it faster and better. The idea is exhilarating. It is also frightening.</p>.<p class="bodytext">Ancient wisdom has always sounded caution about playing God. A tale from the evergreen <span class="italic">Panchatantra</span> tells us about four young men who set out to seek their fortune. The first three considered themselves great scholars. The fourth, not so much. On the way they came across some bones. They knew it was that of a lion. The first scholar put the skeleton together. The second one grafted the skin and flesh. The third one said he can breathe life into it. The fourth and least scholarly young man asked them to wait a little. He climbed up a tall tree. The lion, on coming alive, made a meal of the three scholars.</p>.Out of control in the age of AI.<p class="bodytext">In more recent times, the lure of science created the atom bomb. It was a paradigm shift in understanding the power of atomic energy. On witnessing the nuclear test, J Oppenheimer compared it to the magnificence of God, quoting a verse from the <span class="italic">Bhagvad Gita</span>. ‘If the radiance of a thousand suns were to burst at once into the sky, that would be like the splendour of the mighty one. Now, I am become death, the destroyer of worlds,’ he quoted Lord Krishna.</p>.<p class="bodytext">The destruction of the cosmos had been revealed to them. It was exhilarating. The actual use of the bomb on Hiroshima left the team devastated and haunted forever. It was Oppenheimer who observed, “It is a profound and necessary truth that the great things in science are not found because they are useful; they are found because they are there.”</p>.<p class="bodytext">Societies worldwide still live in fear of someone inadvertently or otherwise pressing the nuclear button. Will the super-intelligent machine come with more difficult and unknown challenges? Will the machine develop a consciousness of its own and control the human mind?</p>.<p class="bodytext">These fears are not unfounded if one goes by the fact that a Chinese AI company has appointed a philosopher to study the consciousness of the machines.</p>