text: **Existential risk**
  
  It has been argued AI will become so powerful that humanity may irreversibly lose control of it. This 
  could, as physicist Stephen Hawking stated, "spell the end of the human race".[265] This scenario has been 
  common in science fiction, when a computer or robot suddenly develops a human-like "self-awareness" 
  (or "sentience" or "consciousness") and becomes a malevolent character.[q] These sci-fi scenarios are 
  misleading in several ways. 
  
  First, AI does not require human-like sentience to be an existential risk. Modern AI programs are given 
  specific goals and use learning and intelligence to achieve them. Philosopher Nick Bostrom argued that if 
  one gives*almost any*goal to a sufficiently powerful AI, it may choose to destroy humanity to achieve it 
  (he used the example of a paperclip factory manager).[267] Stuart Russell gives the example of household 
  robot that tries to find a way to kill its owner to prevent it from being unplugged, reasoning that "you 
  can't fetch the coffee if you're dead."[268] In order to be safe for humanity, a superintelligence would have 
  to be genuinely aligned with humanity's morality and values so that it is "fundamentally on our side".[269] 