Why Kevin Laliberté can't stop thinking about Max Tegmark's book on artificial intelligence

Sultans of String is a Juno-nominated  instrumental group from Toronto that mixes music from Cuba, India and France. Kevin Laliberté, their guitarist, took a break from touring to speak to Shelagh Rogers about a nonfiction book that he recently enjoyed: Life 3.0: Being Human in the Age of Artificial Intelligence by Max Tegmark.

"It goes into the questions that, as a society, we should be asking ourselves as we start to develop artificial intelligence that may one day outperform us. It's a general look at where this trend is going. Once artificial intelligence can do things better than we can — and if its goals are not aligned with ours — then we will have some serious issues. We need to figure out if we just let the companies developing this technology continue and deal with the consequence or do we try to set guidelines. There is no consensus. Tegmark talks to all kinds of thinkers on this subject and everybody has a different opinion. It's a very interesting read. I would say its an essential read for anybody wanting to understand where the world could go and maybe have a say in what direction it's going to go in."   

Kevin Laliberté's comments have been edited and condensed.