Kasparov is considered by many to be one of the most significant chess players in history. From 1986 until his retirement in 2005, Kasparov was ranked as the world number one player for 225 out of 228 months.

His 1997 loss to Deep Blue is often considered to be a watershed moment in the development of computers and AI, as it was the first time the technologies beat a chess grandmaster.

Despite the loss – something he admits was painful at the time – Kasparov is enthusiastic about the oncoming possibilities of AI.

“In the future, I see operators guiding groups of algorithms: it will be a time when machines will be able to generate their own knowledge based on human-produced frameworks,” he said, speaking this week at the ‘Imagine London’ conference, hosted by Automation Anywhere.

“It’s amazing that there is such a big gap between public expectations about AI and real, material effects. The public thinks were at Windows 10, while we’re still probably at MS-Dos.

“Because of this gap, it creates a fear among the general public that the end of humanity is around the corner. I think there’s no risk because it will be up to human operators to decide how to move these machines forward one way or another.

“In the future, I would call these experts shepherds. The shepherds are nudging this box of intelligent algorithms toward this rich pasture of data to generate new knowledge.”

Countering concerns that AI could increase job losses, Kasparov says that new technologies have always caused upheaval in job markets, but this does not mean their utility should be ignored.

“I don’t want to sound callous: jobs are moved and lost every time we discover new technology,” he said.

“In the 19^th century and early 20^th, we saw how agriculture jobs disappeared. In the 20^th century, we saw the jobs in manufacturing, the blue collar jobs, disappearing.

“The people who are under potential attack today have college degrees and Twitter accounts. But from the point of view of history, there’s no difference.

“Human plus machine means finding a better way to combine better interfaces and better processes. Automation disrupts employment, but it also brings new tasks, new jobs and new industries.

“Jobs will be lost, new jobs will be created. My concern is not that AI is too fast. My concern is the opposite – it’s too slow.

“The jobs that can be replaced by machines are already doomed. Trying to protect them is simply protracting agony. Slowing down the moment where we can create new industries that will generate income will create enough financial cushion to help those who are left behind.

“We should start thinking about retraining people because whether we like it or not, even intellectual jobs could be repetitive and these repetitive role jobs will be replaced.”

Elaborating on his own experiences, Kasparov said that many of the founding fathers of computer science thought that being able to beat human players at chess was the “ultimate test” for machine intelligence.

However, he refutes this assertion because a machine’s ability to win at the game does not mean it has intelligence. Deep Blue, for example, was only “as intelligent as your alarm clock… a very expensive one, $10m plus.”

“If we are looking for the watershed moment in the history of human machine chess matches,” Kasparov added, “it is not this match that I lost in New York in 1997, but more likely the match in Philadelphia that I won the year before.

“Because even though I won the match, I lost the first game. I fought back and won three more games, but the fact is that the machine could beat the world champion in one game under normal tournament rules.

“So that was already a sign on the wall about the future. I already had some doubts about for how long we could actually resist this pressure from the computers.

“Today the gap between the strongest chess engines and between Magnus Carlsen, current world champion, it’s about the same as between Ferrari and Usain Bolt.

“There was a short window of opportunity where we can play and compete and then machines are much better forever after.”

He said that while AI is capable of answering a lot of questions very rapidly, humans are still the ones asking the important questions, something he believes machines will never be able to do.

“Our new machines are making us smarter, capable of anything. Our machines are great and doing things that we know how to do well. Let’s then let these machines empower us to achieve things we cannot achieve without them.

“The future of technology is a self-fulfilling prophecy, but we are still in control. We still determine our fate.”

Kasparov is considered by many to be one of the most significant chess players in history. From 1986 until his retirement in 2005, Kasparov was ranked as the world number one player for 225 out of 228 months.

His 1997 loss to Deep Blue is often considered to be a watershed moment in the development of computers and AI, as it was the first time the technologies beat a chess grandmaster.

Despite the loss – something he admits was painful at the time – Kasparov is enthusiastic about the oncoming possibilities of AI.

“In the future, I see operators guiding groups of algorithms: it will be a time when machines will be able to generate their own knowledge based on human-produced frameworks,” he said, speaking this week at the ‘Imagine London’ conference, hosted by Automation Anywhere.

“It’s amazing that there is such a big gap between public expectations about AI and real, material effects. The public thinks were at Windows 10, while we’re still probably at MS-Dos.

“Because of this gap, it creates a fear among the general public that the end of humanity is around the corner. I think there’s no risk because it will be up to human operators to decide how to move these machines forward one way or another.

“In the future, I would call these experts shepherds. The shepherds are nudging this box of intelligent algorithms toward this rich pasture of data to generate new knowledge.”

Countering concerns that AI could increase job losses, Kasparov says that new technologies have always caused upheaval in job markets, but this does not mean their utility should be ignored.

“I don’t want to sound callous: jobs are moved and lost every time we discover new technology,” he said.

“In the 19^th century and early 20^th, we saw how agriculture jobs disappeared. In the 20^th century, we saw the jobs in manufacturing, the blue collar jobs, disappearing.

“The people who are under potential attack today have college degrees and Twitter accounts. But from the point of view of history, there’s no difference.

“Human plus machine means finding a better way to combine better interfaces and better processes. Automation disrupts employment, but it also brings new tasks, new jobs and new industries.

“Jobs will be lost, new jobs will be created. My concern is not that AI is too fast. My concern is the opposite – it’s too slow.

“The jobs that can be replaced by machines are already doomed. Trying to protect them is simply protracting agony. Slowing down the moment where we can create new industries that will generate income will create enough financial cushion to help those who are left behind.

“We should start thinking about retraining people because whether we like it or not, even intellectual jobs could be repetitive and these repetitive role jobs will be replaced.”

Elaborating on his own experiences, Kasparov said that many of the founding fathers of computer science thought that being able to beat human players at chess was the “ultimate test” for machine intelligence.

However, he refutes this assertion because a machine’s ability to win at the game does not mean it has intelligence. Deep Blue, for example, was only “as intelligent as your alarm clock… a very expensive one, $10m plus.”

“If we are looking for the watershed moment in the history of human machine chess matches,” Kasparov added, “it is not this match that I lost in New York in 1997, but more likely the match in Philadelphia that I won the year before.

“Because even though I won the match, I lost the first game. I fought back and won three more games, but the fact is that the machine could beat the world champion in one game under normal tournament rules.

“So that was already a sign on the wall about the future. I already had some doubts about for how long we could actually resist this pressure from the computers.

“Today the gap between the strongest chess engines and between Magnus Carlsen, current world champion, it’s about the same as between Ferrari and Usain Bolt.

“There was a short window of opportunity where we can play and compete and then machines are much better forever after.”

He said that while AI is capable of answering a lot of questions very rapidly, humans are still the ones asking the important questions, something he believes machines will never be able to do.

“Our new machines are making us smarter, capable of anything. Our machines are great and doing things that we know how to do well. Let’s then let these machines empower us to achieve things we cannot achieve without them.

“The future of technology is a self-fulfilling prophecy, but we are still in control. We still determine our fate.”