There are certain pieces of research you expect to be undertaken at Britain’s top universities.
A paper on robots taking over the world might not be one of them.
But at Cambridge University, a team of scientists are preparing for the worst.
Earlier this week, they announced the imminent formation of the Centre for the Study of Existential Risk (CSER), which will examine what many experts believe is the very real possibility of machines wiping out humanity.
If you are unfortunate enough to have sat through all four Terminator films, this will all sound somewhat familiar.
Yet those behind the project are concerned science fiction could become science fact and that some kind of robopocalypse is on its way.
They said that ‘extinction-level risks to our species’ could come from developments in human technology. They cite biotechnology, nanotechnology, climate change and artificial intelligence as areas where such threats could take hold.
The CSER will be established over the next few months and has been founded by Cambridge professors Huw Price and Martin Rees and Skype co-founder Jaan Tallinn.
Having a philosopher, a scientist and a software entrepreneur at the helm of the project will give it a wide perspective. Their goal is to set up a research centre at Cambridge which will explore the risk to humanity’s survival from the very technology it has created. Their main aim is to take on the ‘task of ensuring that our own species has a long-term future’.
Only if humanity allows it. To read more, click here.