"The Future Is Scary and Very Bad for People," Apple Co-Founder Says

If machines end up becoming super-intelligent--as some are predicting--that could lead to a perilous reality for humanity, according to Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak. The technology veteran made his opinion known in a recent interview with Financial Review.

"Like people including Stephen Hawking and Elon Musk have predicted, I agree that the future is scary and very bad for people," he said. "If we build these devices to take care of everything for us, eventually they'll think faster than us and they'll get rid of the slow humans to run companies more efficiently."

Well-known physicist Hawking said previously that AI could be "the worst thing ever for humanity." Meanwhile, Musk--founder of SpaceX and Tesla--said last summer that super-intelligent AI systems are "potentially more dangerous than nukes." Bill Gates is also concerned about the rise of machines.

Wozniak continued: "Will we be the gods? Will we be the family pets? Or will we be ants that get stepped on? I don't know about that … But when I got that thinking in my head about if I'm going to be treated in the future as a pet to these smart machines … well I'm going to treat my own pet dog really nice."

For a deeper dive into Wozniak's comments, check out GameSpot sister site CNET's take.

Are you concerned with machines becoming super-intelligent one day? Let us know in the comments below!