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OpenAI:
Source: Indiatoday

Artificial intelligence (AI) is the future. But is it the right kind of future where AI can end up controlling everything, from how toasty is your toast to how and when to land a plane? That is the question some of the most brilliant engineers and scientists are asking as they form a group to research AI.

Tech behemoths like Infosys and Amazon have joined hands with a few other companies to work on AI that could benefit the world. Elon Musk, Vishal Sikka and Peter Thiel are among people who have come together to invest $1 billion in a group called OpenAI.

The group claims to be a non-profit organization that will use digital intelligence to solve problems faced by people.

The company informs through a blog on its official website that it aims to advance digital intelligence in the way that is most likely to benefit humanity as a whole, "unconstrained by a need to generate financial return".

It will encourage the researchers to publish their work be it blogs, posts or code. It also would share its patents with the world, if any.

"It's hard to fathom how much human-level AI could benefit society, and it's equally hard to imagine how much it could damage society if built or used incorrectly" notes the company. Ilya Sutsveker, former research scientist at Google Brain Team is the research director at OpenAI while the Chief Technology Officer (CTO) is Greg Brockman, former CTO of tech-company Stripe.

Infosys CEO Vishal Sikka, along with Alan Kay, is an adviser to the group. "Our wish is that together the OpenAI team will do unfettered research in the most important, most relevant dimensions of AI, no matter how long it takes to get there, not limited to just identifying dancing cats in videos, but to creating ideas and inventions that amplify our humanity, that help us learn more, see/perceive and understand more, and be more", writes Sikka in a blog post .

Elon Musk, the man behind Tesla who is considered one of the most brilliant futurists right now, too is part of the endeavour. Interestingly, Musk has also been critical of the AI efforts.

"I think we should be very careful about artificial intelligence. If I had to guess at what our biggest existential threat is, it's probably that. So we need to be very careful," Musk once toldThe Guardian.