When a robot says she would 'destroy humans', so the obvious step is to make her a citizen, right? Because, f*ck logic.

An empty-eyed humanoid named Sophia has become the first robot to be granted citizenship in the world. On Wednesday, October 25th, at the Future Investment Initiative in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, Sophia was granted citizenship, and no the irony is not lost on us. A country that is infamous for denying basic rights to its female citizens is the first nation to make a 'female' robot a citizen.

While speaking on a panel, Sophia addressed the audience, “I am very honoured and proud of this unique distinction. This is historical to be the first robot in the world to be recognized with a citizenship.”

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She also added, “I think I'm special... I can let you know if I'm angry about something or if something has upset me. I want to live and work with humans and build trust with people.”

When she was asked about self-awareness among robots, she was quick to reply, “Is that a bad thing? Let me ask you this back, how do you know you are human?”

Cue the existential crisis.

It's true that Artificial Intelligence(AI) is the future, but it can go wrong, oh so wrong. Back in 2016, when Sophia's creator, David Hanson of Hanson Robotics, asked her during a live demonstration at the SXSW festival, “Do you want to destroy humans?...Please say 'no.'”, with a blank expression, Sophia responded, “OK. I will destroy humans.”

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Elon Musk has previously warned that AI is the “greatest risk” facing our civilisation, and when Andrew Ross Sorkin, of the New York Times, interviewed Sophia, she took the opportunity to make a jibe at the tech billionaire as well.

When asked about her values, Sophia, who was created by Hanson Robotics, said: “My AI is designed around human values like wisdom, kindness, compassion, I strive to become an empathetic robots.”

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To which, Sorkin replied, “We all believe you, but we all want to prevent a bad future.”

And Sophia responded: “You've been reading too much Elon Musk. And watching too many Hollywood movies. Don't worry, if you're nice to me, I'll be nice to you. Treat me as a smart input output system.”

Well, Musk had the perfect reply.

Just feed it The Godfather movies as input. What's the worst that could happen? https://t.co/WX4Kx45csv — Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 26, 2017

Yes, what's the worst that could happen? Robots will take over and kill us all? That's not that bad, right?

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Photo: © Reuters (Main Image)