A few of us remember Hal, the fictional AI character that takes control of the spaceship Discovery One in the 1968 film 2001: A Space Odyssey. Hal1 was not friendly when the protagonist of the film interacted with him. He took over, refusing to cooperate with human “passengers.” The character was capable of performing tasks we recognize as AI (artificial intelligence) today: speech recognition, simulated speech, peforming visual input processing such as facial recognition, processing natural language (among other aptitudes), and even lip-reading. (He also was “naturally” ascribed a gender identity.) He assumed control against the will of humans who created him. Hal was said to have been created in 1992. Interestingly, many digital tools we use today were introduced about the same time: the World Wide Web, H-NET, PowerPoint, smartboards, learning management systems like Blackboard, JSTOR, and others.
Although my university is agog about AI and plans...