Ethics and Artificial General Intelligence: Technological Prediction as a Groundwork for Guidelines

Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) is the possible future of computer systems which are as capable as humans across a broad range of intellectual requirements. In order to establish an ethical position or guidelines for the development of AGI, it is important to explore anticipated characteristics about the emergence of AGI: How sudden it could be (jolt), how soon it could be (timing), and how dangerous it could be (risk). By extrapolating today's trends in development and limitations of current AI algorithms, informed speculation can help set ethical positions and guidelines on the proper course. This paper concludes that the emergence of AGI will be gradual, soon, and only moderately dangerous and begins to address how ethical issues will change as AGI emerges from narrow AI.