Page No: 5 Christmas Issue 2015
Computer Master Class
oding can mean many different things, and if you like one you will probably like them all! For example: this document is typed in Word, coded in HTML and Word is programmed in C. Even Word’s irritating spelling and grammar check is coded in C. You may have noticed the big C at the start of the document. This is because C is a big programming language. However, you can program C to crack codes – another meaning of coding. If you didn’t already know, code can mean traffic lights, genetic code, password, law. The Highway Code, the Highway Law. Password, code. You probably use a code of some sort at least once a day without realising it. To people who don’t know English, this article might seem like a code. To them you would be using a code all the time. 74686973206973206120706172616772617068 is the hexadecimal ASCII version of “this is a paragraph”. A computer doesn’t think in letters or even normal numbers, it thinks in 1s and 0s. To a computer 1100001 means “a” and 10010100 means “””. However, a computer has to have eight digits when it thinks of letters so “a” would be 01100001. There are still more types of code like spy codes. Very soon spying on computers will become a thing of the past because of quantum networks, but that’s for another day. Computers try to stop spies unless they are spies themselves. For now though, spies are helped by computers, but they’re also found, recorded and stopped by computers. Computers try to stop spies...unless they are spies themselves. Penn Mackintosh, 7W C
Could AI Spell The End of Mankind?
It’s just sci-fi right? In reality, Artificial Intelligence or “AI“ isn’t that far away. We have already developed clumsy vacuum cleaners that hoover our floors. Soon we will have developed A.I for more complicated tasks. Imagine AI programmed to make paperclips at all costs. Then a human comes along and to tries to turn the machine off, but the AI sees the human as a threat to its paperclip making and deals with the threat. The AI learns from this and sees all of humanity as a threat. It then starts to try and wipe out humanity. My point is not that paper clips are dangerous but that we need to be careful, because AI could quickly and easily slip out
of our control. Scientists predict that computers will be smarter than us by the end of the century. As AI gets smarter and learns, it will develop better and more advanced versions of itself. As it gets better it upgrades faster, creating an intelligence explosion in which machines evolve more in an hour than humans have in millions of years. Robots don’t think for themselves, they merely follow their programming, but could they accidentally be programmed to see mankind as an enemy? My opinion is that we should keep developing artificial intelligence, but we should be careful how we program them. We must follow the three rules of robotics: the first rule states that a robot should not injure a human being; the second that a robot must obey human commands; and the third, that a robot must protect its own existence. The second and third rules are to be disregarded if they conflict with the first, so we should be okay, but we must always be in control of what the AI does. Kai Weakley-Rugge 7E
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