A.I. can be used in many ways that are very beneficial for society. But the current use of A.I. isn't necessarily aligned with the goals of building a better society, unfortunately. But, but we could change that. A.I. will be viewed as an age of enlightenment. Our children and their children will see A.I. as serendipity, that A.I. is here to liberate us from having to do routine jobs, and push us to do what we love, and push us to think what it means to be human. But what if humans mishandle this new power?

Here's a growing trend in artificial intelligence. Dating video games and other applications let users carry on virtual relationships with computerized girlfriends ranging from career women to Japanese schoolgirls. There's even something for the ladies. How soon will there be artificial intelligence of such complexity that protecting its well-being and rights becomes a serious political and social concern? In what year will there be an app or computer program or a device that you not only love but that possibly, within the realm of believability might actually love you ...back?

Everywhere you go, you generate a cloud of data. You're trailing data, everything that you do is producing data. And then there are computers looking at that data that are learning, and these computers are essentially trying to serve you better. They're trying to personalize things to you. They're trying to adapt the world to you. So on the one hand, this is great, because the world will get adapted to you without you even having to explicitly adapt it. There's also a danger, because the entities in the companies that are in control of those algorithms don't necessarily have the same goals as you, and this is where I think people need to be aware that, what's going on, so they can have more control over it.
We came into this new world thinking that we were users of social media and search engines. It didn't occur to us that social media and search engines were actually using us.

When it comes to illusions, optical illusions get all the attention. But the whole body you have can be fooled and can fool the brain. What is touch? Is it real, or is it just in our heads? Michael Stevens decides to find out.

Autistic minds provide windows into how we all think, feel, and behave. A complete brain science should be able to account for all kinds of minds and brains. As long as some minds remain a mystery, so too will all minds.
Michael Stevens travels to London to meet a blind, autistic savant with astonishing musical abilities, and volunteers to have his brain's function temporarily disrupted at UCLA's Neuromodulation Lab.

Exoplanets, strange worlds outside our solar system. We're discovering the cosmos is full of alien planets. Alien worlds that challenge our understanding of planetary systems. Hellishly hot worlds, violently colliding worlds, worlds getting eaten by their stars. There's much, much more out there than we had ever imagined.
Exoplanets are shaking up our understanding of the universe. The cosmos is a chaotic array of the odd, the weird, and the wonderful. The more we find, the less we know.