In the EXPONENTIAL MINDS’ Artificial Intelligence Bulletin – AI is Hundreds of Years Away? we see an experts weighing in on long and short terms visions for AI, Apple stepping into the arena, AI headhunters, Machine Made, and human manipulation.

Human-Level AI Is Right Around the Corner—or Hundreds of Years Away

Artificial intelligence is progressing rapidly, and its impact on our daily lives will only increase. Today, there are still many things humans can do that computers can’t. But will it always be that way? Should we worry about a future in which the capabilities of machines rival those of humans across the board? For IEEE Spectrum’s June 2017 special issue, we asked a range of technologists and visionaries to weigh in on what the future holds for AI and brainlike computing.

1. Robin Hanson
2. Martine Rothblatt
3. Ruchir Puri
4. Ray Kurzweil
5. Carver Mead
6. Nick Bostrom
7. Rodney Brooks
8. Gary Marcus
9. Jürgen Schmidhuber

Read more at IEEE Spectrum

Apple is finally serious about artificial intelligence

As research teams at Google, Microsoft, Facebook, IBM, and even Amazon have broken new ground in artificial intelligence in recent years, Apple always seemed to be the odd man out. It was too closed off to meaningfully integrate AI into the company’s software—it wasn’t a part of the research community, and didn’t have developer tools available for others to bring AI to its systems.
That’s changing. Through a slew of updates and announcements today at its annual developer conference, Apple made it clear that the machine learning found everywhere else in Silicon Valley is foundational to its software as well, and it’s giving developers the power to use AI in their own iOS apps as well.
Read more at Quartz

Career site Workey raises $8M to replace headhunters with artificial intelligence

One of the ways companies fill their ranks with good employees is by scouting “passive talent,” or people who aren’t currently looking for new jobs but might be convinced with the right offer. This usually takes hours of networking, but a Tel Aviv-headquartered startup called Workey uses artificial intelligence to streamline the process by matching companies with potential candidates. Workey launched in the U.S. today and also announced that it has raised $8 million in Series A funding.

The round was led by PICO Partners and Magma VC and brings the total Workey has raised so far to $9.6 million, including its earlier seed funding. Workey will use the new capital to expand in the U.S., open an office in New York City, and hire people for its research and development and data science teams.
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Workey’s recommendation system then matches companies with promising candidates. If a company requests an introduction through the site, users can respond by revealing their full details. Otherwise, all rejections are anonymous. As an example, Workey’s co-founders say Yahoo has found several candidates by spending 10 minutes a week on Workey.
 
Read more at TechCrunch

Machine made

Forget flying cars. The space age technology the world really needs now is the Jetson family’s robot chef, which could spit out Elroy’s breakfast at the push of a button while also serving up a bone to the cartoon family’s pooch, Astro.

Good news: We’re closer than you might think, thanks to a growing interest among techies to apply their smarts to the really important stuff – the creation and consumption of food and drink. There’s already plenty of apps, such as Logameal, that promise to transform our lives by evaluating a meal’s nutritional value, or Chefling, which will suggest recipes based on the contents of your pantry. Hello Egg, though, a voice-activated kitchen assistant aims to be the first all-in-one culinary sensation of the digital age. It will hit the market this year and, similar to Amazon’s Alexa or Apple’s Siri, the “Eggspert” will help tailor meals to your tastes and dietary restrictions while keeping track of calories and teaching cooking techniques. Should you be willing to hand over all household management to an artificial intelligence device, Eggspert will even draw up grocery lists and submit them to the market for pickup or delivery.

Eggspert may be smart enough to predict your next favourite dish, but it will never learn how to cook it. For that quantum leap in intelligent kitchen design, there’s the Smarty Pan (which keeps track of both frying temperatures and calories) and an Intelligent Oven to ensure you never experience fallen soufflé trauma again. But what extreme kitchen gadget hoarders should really hold out for is Moley, a fully robotic chef with the smarts to make 100 gourmet meals and the ability to learn many more. Due out in 2018, it will cost about the same as an economy car (estimated at $14,000 (U.S.)) and will synch up with a delivery service that can drop off the prepped and pre-portioned ingredients it needs to cook an entire meal. Its designers at Moley Robotics are working on teaching it to do the dishes too but, so far, Moley just fills the sink with soapy water and leaves the dishes to soak.

Read more at Globe & Mail

We Need to Talk About the Power of AI to Manipulate Humans

Our tendency to become emotionally attached to chatbots could be exploited by companies seeking a profit.

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Working on open artificial-intelligence technology and brain-computer interfaces, or forming ethics committees, are just part of the solution. We need to consciously build systems that work for the benefit of humans and society. They cannot have addiction, clicks, and consumption as their primary goal. AI is growing up, and will be shaping the nature of humanity. AI needs a mother.
Read more at MIT Technology Review