Humans Need Not Apply: Skynet Pieces Coming Together?

Recently Elon Musk indicated that he thought Artificial Intelligence (AI) was “potentially more dangerous than nukes” and it’s easy to dismiss such statements as hyperbole or over generalization but…can we? Should we? Are we really aware of what we are doing?

Elon Musk is no “conspiracy nut.” He is founder of such technology companies at Tesla and SpaceX. Are we listening to what he is saying? Is he the only one with this concern? Here is an article. No, he is not the only scientist concerned Scientists Worry Machines May Outsmart Man (older article from 2009).

As more evidence, here is a rather sobering video called “Humans Need Not Apply” which, even if you don’t think we’ll all be killed by robots…presents a good argument that we might all be unemployed by robots.

And without humans to train for new jobs, no Learning and Development professionals will be needed. Are we ready for this? The video is well done and striking in it’s message.

Also here is an interesting article about a team of Hungarian researchers who have created 10 drones that self-organize as they move through the air. The drones can negotiate tricky paths, such as when their route becomes tightly confined. When that happens, some of them hover in place to wait their turn. And it’s all done without a central computer or controlling device. You can check the article here.

Finally, this video may put it all into perspective. After all, science fiction has had an uncanny way of becoming science fact over the last few decades.

So, perhaps this post is going a little too far and we don’t have to worry about Skynet wiping out all humans, but we may need to carefully consider how technology and robots might wipe out of a large number of jobs and, by association, a large amount of learning and development professionals.