It is not much to look at. But it might change the world.

Frontier, a supercomputer at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee, has performed more than a quintillion calculations a second.

Researchers hope Frontier's super-speed computing will open up a brave new worldA phrase from Shakespeare's play The Tempest which was used as the title of a dystopian novel by Aldous Huxley.. It might be able to simulate stars, investigate the tiniest subatomic particles or allow AI to treat disease.

It is also a benchmark in the contest between human and computer intelligence. Neuroscientists estimate our brains can perform about 10,000 trillion calculations per second. Well short of what Frontier can do.

Over the past decades, machines have overtaken humans in various fields. They can be fed more information and access it in an instant. They have more memory than us.

In 1996, a computer called Deep Blue defeated chess champion Garry KasparovRussian chess champion who holds the record for most months as world no. 1. He is a vocal critic of Putin's Russia.. The world record for solving a Rubik's CubeA puzzle toy invented by Hungarian sculptor Erno Rubik in 1974. It is a cube faced with squares of different colours. To complete the puzzle, one has to spin all squares so that each side displays only one colour. is held by a robot. Chinese online retailer Alibaba has reportedly built an artificial intelligence (AI) system that can defeat humans at a reading comprehension test.

Many have worried that AI systems might one day grow so powerful that they take over the world. As far back as 1872, Victorian writer Samuel ButlerButler's Erewhon (1872) is often considered one of the first great science fiction novels. imagined super-smart robots turning their creators into "affectionate machine-tickling aphidsA type of tiny insect that lives by sucking the sap from plants. A common example is the greenfly.".

Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak once said: "Never trust a computer you can't throw out a window." Frontier fills a whole room. It would take heavy machinery and a record-breaking window to throw out.

Robots have already taken some factory jobs. AI has been trained to write articles, perform surgery and untangle simple legal cases. One day, perhaps we will all be out of work, with drastic consequences for the lives of the newly jobless.

Others say there is nothing to fear. Computers are designed to improve our lives. Tech complements our skills. As AI entrepreneur Satya Mallick says: "It is not a competition. It is a collaboration."

AI may be better at calculating. But humans can do much more than that. We can think in ways beyond simple yeses and nos. As Pablo Picasso once said: "Computers are useless. They can only give you answers."

Our creative intelligence allows us to do things technology cannot. In 2018, Christie's sold an AI-generated portrait for $432,500. But the AI had to be programmed and fed data by humans. As long as we can create and imagine new things, we have the advantage.

Yes: The robot-run future imagined in science fiction may never come to pass. But it is wise to be wary. To be afraid is a sign of common sense. Fear may help us understand more about AI and ourselves.

No: Computers, said Bill Gates, "can be shaped by their user". This remains true no matter how good they are at certain tasks. Technology is our servant. Besides, all devices come with an off switch.

Or... A weapon only becomes dangerous in human hands. We should fear not AI itself but the people that might use it for sinister ends, whether cruel governments, cyber-criminals or corporations.