We need to get more innovative in how we navigate the potential risks and benefits of artificial intelligence

Getting the ethics of artificial intelligence right is important. But are we becoming so obsessed with the rights and wrongs of AI that we’re taking our eye off the potential risks?

What have pendulums, the future, and Iron Man, got in common? More than you might at first think! Several years ago now, I had the pleasure of being the inaugural Charles and Rita Gelman Professor of Risk Science at the University of Michigan. As is often the case with such positions, I was asked to give a public lecture to mark my inauguration.

If there’s one thing we cannot escape as we look to the future, it’s risk. Risk is inevitable in a universe where past “causes” connect in complex and often unpredictable ways with future “effects,” and every action we take leads to reactions that are detrimental to someone in some way.