Artificial general intelligence could be the best or worst thing that ever happens to us.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is a buzzword that strums up a lot of conversation about improving the quality of human life or the risk of worldwide annihilation. Even the sci-fi movies we love and hate repeatedly warn us of a dystopia when it comes to AI.

Separating facts from fiction, the AI systems we currently have aren't capable of being self-aware or reasoning, let alone dominating the world. However, with the current pace of technological advancements, creating sentient, self-aware machines isn't so impractical.

In this article, we'll discuss artificial general intelligence, an AI with the same intelligence level as humans, how far we're from achieving it, and whether it will be our best innovation or greatest threat.