Good Intentions, Bad Idea? Swiss Scientists Are Teaching Robots How To Hunt

Just yesterday, we were discussing EU’s belief that in a couple of years AI could take control of the world and pose a serious threat to our survival. Today, we’re finding out that, despite this knowledge, scientists are helping robots become predators. So, who’s gonna be the prey?! #machinemagic

Scientists from the Institute of Neuroinformatics at the University of Zurich are actually teaching robots how to hunt “prey”, using a special software to help them mark its targets and go for it. Before you start losing your mind over this alarming piece of news, let us tell you that the researchers have the best intentions. Their idea is to help machines understand their environments and the location of a target in real time. A way to understand what they’re going for is to “imagine future luggage or shopping carts that follow you. This way, the problem is less like a predator and its prey and more like herding, or a parent and child.”, said Tobi Delbruck, professor at the Institute of Neuroinformatics.

In order to prepare them to focus and pounce, they are using hardware inspired after real, animal predators. Also, the robot in training uses a special “silicon retina” that helps it detect changes in illumination and pass the information to the neural network. After its processing, robots will start to “see” patterns and in time learn from them, locating a target more easily.

That said, we can’t shake the feeling that if this goes wrong in the near future, we’re kind of doomed.