5 things to know about artificial intelligence and its use

WASHINGTON — In the sci-fi thriller “Ex Machina,” the wonders and dangers of artificial intelligence are embodied in a beautiful, cunning android named Ava. Five things to know about artificial intelligence: __ SCIENTISTS PREDICT WEAPONS ‘WITHIN YEARS’ Autonomous weapons that can search and destroy targets could be fielded quickly, according to an open letter released Tuesday and signed by hundreds of scientists and technology experts. “Unlike nuclear weapons, they require no costly or hard-to-obtain raw materials, so they will become ubiquitous and cheap for all significant military powers to mass-produce.” __ AVA-LIKE ROBOTS A LONG WAY OFF Robots with Ava’s sophistication are at least 25 years away and perhaps decades beyond that to realize, according to the experts. “NASA still has to control spacecraft remotely.” The most challenging aspect of an Ava-like robot is the hardware, said Toby Walsh, a professor of artificial intelligence at the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia, and at Australia’s Centre of Excellence for Information Communication Technologies. “But the software is likely less than 50 years away.” __ I SPY Facial recognition technology that could be used to spot targets already performs better than humans do, said Bart Selman, a computer science professor at Cornell University in New York.