Communications of the ACM
The opinion archive provides access to past opinion stories from Communications of the ACM and other sources by date.
June 2016
From ACM Opinion
Waiting For Gödel
In June of 1975, the Office of the White House Press Secretary announced President Gerald R. Ford’s picks for the National Medal of Science. One went to the Austrian-born mathematician and logician Kurt Gödel.
From ACM Opinion
How the Computer Beat the Go Player
The victory in March of the computer program AlphaGo over one of the world's top handful of go players marks the highest accomplishment to date for the burgeoning field of machine learning and intelligence.
From ACM Opinion
How Alan Turing Found Machine Thinking in the Human Mind
In 1935, Alan Turing set out to build a reputation by outflanking the world's leading mathematician.
From ACM Opinion
How to Stop Robocalls … or at Least Fight Back
"This is a final notice from the IRS."
From ACM Opinion
Meet the Smartest, Cutest AI-Powered Robot You've Ever Seen
Boris Sofman taps his phone, and the robot on the conference room table in front of him wakes up. Not in that gadget-y way, like when a laptop screen turns on, though.
From ACM Opinion
How Risky Are the World Economic Forum's Top 10 Emerging Technologies For 2016?
Take an advanced technology. Add a twist of fantasy. Stir well, and watch the action unfold.
From ACM Opinion
Machines that Talk to S May Soon Sense Our Feelings, Too
After great promise in the 1960s that machines would soon think like humans, progress stalled for decades. Only in the past 10 years or so has research picked up, and now there are several popular products on the market that…
From ACM Opinion
After Orlando, the Homemade Ar-15 Industry Surges
In the wake of the worst mass shooting in US history, many Americans want to ban civilians from buying the AR-15, that ultra-popular, all-American killing tool.
From ACM Opinion
Self-Driving Cars Could Flip the Auto Insurance Industry on Its Head
As the driverless car gets closer to reality, so too does the dilemma of how to insure the car and its owner.
From ACM Opinion
Bringing Precision to the AI Safety Discussion
We believe that AI technologies are likely to be overwhelmingly useful and beneficial for humanity. But part of being a responsible steward of any new technology is thinking through potential challenges and how best to address…
From ACM Opinion
AI Doomsayer Says His Ideas Are Catching On
Oxford University philosophy professor Nick Bostrom says major tech companies are listening to his warnings about investing in "AI safety" research.
From ACM Opinion
Here's Your Chance to Decode President Lincoln's Secret Messages
On April 12, 1865—three days after Gen. Robert E. Lee surrendered at Appomattox and two days before President Abraham Lincoln was assassinated—the president sent a telegram to Maj. Gen. Godfrey Weitzel, whose Union forces were…
From ACM Opinion
The Lopsided Geography of Wikipedia
Think about how often, in the course of a week, you visit Wikipedia.
From ACM Opinion
Basic Income: A Sellout of the American Dream
Matt Krisiloff is in a small, glass-walled conference room off the lobby of Y Combinator’s office in San Francisco's South of Market neighborhood, shouting distance from some of the country's wealthiest startups, many of which…
From ACM Opinion
Orlando Shows the Limits of Facebook's Terror Policing
Both leading up to and during his deadly assault on Orlando night club Pulse, Omar Mateen accessed his Facebook account.
From ACM Opinion
Too Cute For Their Own Good, Robots Get Self-Defense Instincts
At a shopping mall here one recent Friday, six-year-old Ruby Dowling made friends with a friendly egg-shaped robot.
From ACM Opinion
It'll Be Very Hard For Terrorism Victim's Family to Win Lawsuit Against Twitter
Legal experts say that it will be an uphill battle for the plaintiffs who filed a lawsuit this week against Twitter, Facebook, and Google.
From ACM Opinion
The Physicist Who Studies Isis Communities Online
Neil Johnson, a physicist at the University of Miami in Florida, studies patterns that emerge in complex systems.
From ACM Opinion
For the Golden State Warriors, Brain-Zapping Could Provide an Edge
Back in March, James Michael McAdoo, the power forward for the Golden State Warriors, tweeted out a photo of himself in the training room, sporting a pair of slick over-the-ear headphones.
From ACM Opinion
Losing Control: The Dangers of Killer Robots
New technology could lead humans to relinquish control over decisions to use lethal force.
From ACM Opinion
What Happens If Gps Fails?
In only took thirteen millionths of a second to cause a whole lot of problems.
From ACM Opinion
Deep Learning Isn't a Dangerous Magic Genie. It's Just Math
Deep learning is rapidly 'eating' artificial intelligence. But let's not mistake this ascendant form of artificial intelligence for anything more than it really is.
From ACM Opinion
Barefoot Networks' New Chips Will Transform the Tech Industry
Nick McKeown and his new startup, Barefoot Networks, just launched out of stealth. That's Silicon Valley-speak for trumpeting the arrival of your new startup in a press release and asking lots of reporters to repeat what it says…
From ACM Opinion
Q&a: John Chambers
Cisco Systems designs, makes, and sells the routers, switches, and other networking equipment with which businesses connect their computers, manage data centers, and access the Internet.
From ACM Opinion
What Are the Odds We Are Living in a Computer Simulation?
Last week, Elon Musk, the billionaire founder of Tesla Motors, SpaceX, and other cutting-edge companies, took a surprising question at the Code Conference, a technology event in California.
From ACM Opinion
A Russian Cybersleuth Battles the 'dark Ages' of the Internet
A sense of menace stirs right off the elevator on the fifth floor of Kaspersky Lab's Moscow headquarters, where a small television screen displays cyberthreats occurring in real time around the world—a blinking, spinning, color…
From ACM Opinion
Wikipedia Warns Against French Attempt to Extend Eu Privacy Law Globally
Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales has said an attempt by France to give an online privacy ruling global force is opening up a "disastrous can of worms" and could spur global censorship.
From ACM Opinion
Will the Constitution Protect Your Next Smartphone?
More than a decade ago, the keynote speaker at a major annual cybersecurity conference strode into the spotlight and predicted the death of the password.
From ACM Opinion
The All-American Iphone
Donald Trump says that if he becomes president, he will "get Apple to start making their computers and their iPhones on our land, not in China." Bernie Sanders has also called for Apple to manufacture some devices in the U.S…
From ACM Opinion
Jobs Threatened By Machines: A Once 'stupid' Concern Gains Respect
They replaced horses, didn't they? That's how the late, great economist Wassily Leontief responded 35 years ago to those who argued technology would never really replace people's work.