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LinkedIn's and eBay's Founders Are Donating $20 Million To Protect Us From AI (recode.net)
Reid Hoffman, the founder of LinkedIn, and Pierre Omidyar, the founder of eBay, have each committed $10 million to fund academic research and development aimed at keeping artificial intelligence systems ethical and to prevent building AI that may harm society. Recode reports: The fund received an additional $5 million from the Knight Foundation and two other $1 million donations from the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation and Jim Pallotta, founder of the Raptor Group. The $27 million reserve is being anchored by MIT's Media Lab and Harvard's Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society. The Ethics and Governance of Artificial Intelligence Fund, the name of the fund, expects to grow as new funders continue to come on board. AI systems work by analyzing massive amounts of data, which is first profiled and categorized by humans, with all their prejudices and biases in tow. The money will pay for research to investigate how socially responsible artificially intelligent systems can be designed to, say, keep computer programs that are used to make decisions in fields like education, transportation and criminal justice accountable and fair. The group also hopes to explore ways to talk with the public about and foster understanding of the complexities of artificial intelligence. The two universities will form a governing body along with Hoffman and the Omidyar Network to distribute the funds. The $20 million from Hoffman and the Omidyar Network are being given as a philanthropic grant -- not an investment vehicle.
"Self replication and a desire for continued existence are the only thing that might motivate AIs to wipe us out" - not quite!
The most likely reason for an AI to kill you is that its designer/operator/owner/cracker instructed it to do so. And believe me, there are people who want to see you dead, no matter who you are or what you do. Once AIs are capable enough to autonomously control an armed combat robot unit, such units will be build, with the usual reasoning that it's just for our safety and because "it's controlled by us, and we are the good ones". And then one day somebody will decide to have it go against you. Might be even an accident/misunderstanding/prank.