Author: The Conversation

What happens when natural selection, the most powerful process driving change in the living world, shapes artificial intelligence (AI), perhaps the most potent technology humanity has invented to date? We might be about to find out. According to a new paper published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, we are entering the era of “evolvable AI” – AI systems that can undergo evolution. In turn, that might give rise to a major transition in evolution. How major is “major”? Well, in nearly 4 billion years, there have only been eight, or perhaps only seven, other major transitions. But we’ll get…

South Africa’s first attempt to establish a binding artificial intelligence (AI) policy framework came to an abrupt halt just 16 days after it was officially gazetted. On 10 April, the Department of Communications and Digital Technologies published the Draft South Africa National Artificial Intelligence Policy for public comment. Journalists checked the references and found that they contained fabrications. These fell into two categories: academic journals that do not exist; and real journals in which the referenced research articles were never published. Such fabrications are typical of a known generative AI problem called hallucination. Withdrawing the draft, the communications minister was frank: the problem was not…

A woman strolls into a grocery store, thinking about grabbing some apples. Before she even reaches the produce aisle, a security camera has scanned her face. Whether the system is checking for shoplifters or simply logging her arrival, her face has joined a digital ledger, a trace she can’t easily erase. Retailers, banks, airports, stadiums and office buildings are doing the same. But what if the woman’s facial information is stolen or misused? If a cybercriminal steals her password, she can change it. If they acquire her credit card number, she can cancel the card. But she can’t reset or…

OpenAI officially discontinued its video generation tool, Sora, on April 26, 2026. I’m a computer scientist who’s been developing AI tools and studying their evolution and adoption for the past decade, and I wasn’t surprised by OpenAI’s decision to shut down Sora. To me, the challenges Sora faced reflect deeper limitations of AI’s creative capacities that are becoming harder to ignore. Problems from the start OpenAI unveiled Sora on Feb. 15, 2024, as an AI tool that gave users the ability to create short videos from text prompts. To pull this off, the technology essentially predicted how images would change from frame to frame…

Hundreds of millions of people consult artificial intelligence chatbots on a daily basis for everything from product recommendations to romance, making them a tempting audience to target with potentially below-the-radar advertising. Indeed, our research suggests AI chatbots could easily be used for covert advertising to manipulate their human users. We are computer scientists who have been tracking AI safety and privacy for several years. In a study we published in an Association for Computing Machinery journal, we found that chatbots trained to embed personalised product ads in replies to queries influenced people’s choices about products. And most participants didn’t recognise that they were being manipulated. These…

The legendary American bank robber Willie Sutton spent 40 years robbing banks because, as he claimed in his autobiography, he loved doing it. And when asked why he chose banks of all places to rob, he allegedly replied: “Because that’s where the money is.” Back in 2017, I wrote a book predicting it wasn’t just lovable rogues like Sutton who would soon be robbing banks, but artificial intelligence (AI). That day, it appears, could now be about to arrive. Banks around the world are seriously worried cyber criminals will soon take advantage of the latest advances in AI to try to rob them. The digital back door…

Americans spend a remarkable amount of time shopping – more than on education, volunteering, or even talking on the phone. But the way they shop is shifting dramatically, as major platforms and retailers are racing to automate commercial decision-making. Artificial intelligence agents can already search for products, recommend options and even complete purchases on a consumer’s behalf. Yet many shoppers remain uneasy about handing over control. Although many consumers report using some AI assistance, most currently say they wouldn’t want an AI agent to autonomously complete a shopping transaction, according to a recent survey from the consultancy firm Bain & Company. As scholars studying…

Meta and Microsoft are the latest software companies to announce big cuts to their global workforce. Both companies are also making big investments in artificial intelligence (AI). The link seems obvious. Meta’s chief people officer, Janelle Gale, said the job cuts – about 10% of staff or almost 8,000 workers – serve to “offset the other investments we’re making”. Meta boss Mark Zuckerberg has previously spoken about a “major AI acceleration” with spending in excess of US$115bn planned this year. Microsoft is also betting big on AI. The company also just announced early retirement packages for about 7% of its US workforce. The two tech giants join Atlassian,…

The limit of what artificial intelligence can achieve, known as frontier AI, has crossed another threshold. AI can now plan and execute sophisticated cyber operations with minimal guidance at speeds far beyond human capability. That, at least, is the evidence from an independent test of Claude Mythos Preview, the latest and most advanced model in the Claude family of AI systems, developed by US tech firm Anthropic. Similar to ChatGPT, these can understand and generate human-like text, analyse information, and solve complex problems. The finance sector is alarmed. It relies on highly interconnected digital systems that are especially attractive targets for sophisticated cyber-attacks. A successful breach could disrupt payments, freeze access…

NASA’s Curiosity rover has identified seven new organic compounds on the planet Mars, according to new research published in Nature Communications. The researchers believe this organic matter may have been preserved on Mars for more than 3.4 billion years. But is it evidence of life? It’s not yet possible to determine whether it was delivered by a meteor (or comet or interplanetary dust particles), was formed through geological processes or may be linked to potential ancient life on Mars. This begs a few questions: What exactly is life? How do we know what to look for? Why is it so hard to determine if…