AI will be as smart as humans by 2040, smarter by 2060

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Artificial intelligence has gotten way smarter as of late, but it still stops short of being as smart as us. After all, without humans to plug information into it, it's got nothing. For now, anyway — the way things are advancing, we may well be dealing with AI as smart as us, if not smarter, in less time than you think.

According to Ben Ross, an expert at MYOB Technology, artificial intelligence is on pace to match human intelligence by 2040. He figures this thanks to averaging out many expert predictions, plus relying on Moore's Law, the idea that some computer parts double their powers every year. So by 2040 they'll have advanced to the point where they're as smart as us. If that's not amazing (or scary) enough, Ross also feels that by 2060, AI will actually surpass human-level intelligence, and what that means for us fleshy types is basically in our hands. As Ross put it in his TED Talk, "We have time to make sure that we guide its pathway forward — ensuring a great outcome instead of bad." In short, super-intelligent, super-powerful AI could mean Wall-E or it could mean Skynet. It's our choice.