Dear colleagues, Our visitors from the Singularity Institute <http://singularity.org/#> are on their way to IDSIA and will be giving a short talk at the following time: *WHEN*: Friday 14 December; 14:45 (sharp!) to 15:15 *WHERE*: Room 222, Galleria 1 (that's our big lecture room) *ABOUT THE SINGULARITY INSTITUTE*: Since 2000, Singularity Institute has been a leader in studying the impact of advanced artificial intelligence on the future. We have expanded to become a networking center for scientists, entrepreneurs, and investors involved in emerging technologies. Our annual conference, the Singularity Summit, attracts about 1,000 attendees, with coverage from top media such as TIME, NPR, Scientific American, Forbes, Wired, and The New York Times. Every year, machines surpass human ability in new domains. When they surpass our ability to design artificial intelligence, they will be able to recursively improve their own intelligence in a way that could quickly lead to vastly more intelligent agents — an ‘intelligence explosion’. If these agents are programmed with stable, beneficial goals, their arrival could bring unprecedented well-being to Earth and beyond. Writing about the growing Singularity movement in a 2010 New York Times op-ed, cyberspace pioneer Jaron Lanier wrote, “These are ideas with tremendous currency in Silicon Valley; these are guiding principles, not just amusements, for many of the most influential technologists.” Singularity Institute exists to ensure that the powerful effects of advanced machine intelligence are beneficial for society. Our research and academic outreach has set the agenda for this important project concerning the future of humanity, and we see many opportunities in the future for additional progress. Groeten, Bas On 14/12/2012 10:16, Bas Steunebrink wrote: