Beware the tech overlord's promise of 'enlightenment' through AI

Reid Hoffman, the co-founder of LinkedIn and an early funder of OpenAI, recently wrote an op-ed titled “A.I. Will Empower Humanity.” In his article, which reads a bit like a long-form advertisement or press release, Hoffman tries to convince people they’ll be missing out if they don’t surrender all their data to artificial intelligence.

“So imagine a world in which an A.I. knows your stress levels tend to drop more after playing World of Warcraft than after a walk in nature,” he writes. “Imagine a world in which an A.I. can analyze your reading patterns and alert you that you’re about to buy a book where there’s only a 10 percent chance you’ll get past Page 6.”