The future of technology is difficult to predict, due to its ever-increasing complexity, however, there are certain themes that follow all technology: potential, purpose, privacy, and ethics. These themes were important in the past but were often not taken seriously until after catastrophe. For this reason, they, in the context of artificial intelligence, are the focus of my final paper.

Potential demonstrates the limits that technology can reach within a reasonable amount of time. This is crucial because measuring potential can help humanity prepare and better react when those limits steer negatively. Purpose is important because it allows us to weigh the risks vs the rewards. For example, car crashes result in the death of thousands every year, but cars serve a purpose that is extremely useful to modern society, which is why they are still around. Privacy is a fundamental human right that is too often infringed upon but is something that has had a lot of light shed upon itself over the last decade, so carrying that light into future technology is very important. Lastly, ethics remains paramount because it wraps up all of the three themes and really tries to question whether technology should even be advanced after seeing everything it has done and has the potential to do.