CAMBRIDGE, Mass.

It's hard to call Elon Musk a technophobe the Tesla CEO has been a vocal proponentofspace exploration, the electric carand something called a "hyperloop."

But there's one bit of future techMusk isn't so keen on: artificial intelligence. And duringa recentMITaerospace symposium, Musk issued a gravewarning about the potentialdangers of AI research.

"With artificial intelligence, we are summoning the demon. You know all those stories where there's theguy with thepentagram and the holy water, and he's like, yeah, he's sure he can control the demon. Doesn't work out."

Of course, we've all seen plenty of big-budget sci-fi warnings about havoc-wreaking robots, but Muskhas actually been pretty consistent with his AI phobia.

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In June,he told CNBChis investments in AI researchwere meant "to keep an eye on" the technology, anda tweetfrom early August warns artificial intelligence could be"potentially more dangerous than nukes."

But this is the first time demons havebeen brought into the conversation, and a few sites took Musk to task for his hyperbole.

ACNET writerquips"Who knows what demonic hellscape could emerge if we ever let artificially intelligent machines get ahold of aOuijaboard."WhileMashable writes,"Forget Tony Stark, the comic book character most oftenassociated with Musk, it may be time to start thinkingDoctor Strange. Pentagram? Really, Elon?"

Musk's concern issomewhat timely AI research has hit a new wave of popularity among big tech companies. Googlerecently acquiredtwo artificial intelligence companies,adding to its growing stable of AI researchers.

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Elon Musk on artificial intelligence: 'We're summoning the demon'