It is a staple of Science Fiction that once a computer (or computer network) becomes sufficiently complex, sentience is inevitable. And big sentient computers can be bad news. As both the owner of what is almost certainly the world’s largest general purpose computing cluster, and our self-nominated bastion against evil, I really hope someone at Google is keeping an eye on this.

When Tesla was asked one day what motivated him, the greatest human tinkerer of all time didn’t miss a beat as he responded with a surprising mixture of hubris and humility, “all I ever really wanted was to stand proudly beside my creator.” Aldous Huxley would agree.