If the AI doesn’t have good goals programmed in, we’re fucked

When they built a new building at my college they decided to to use “AI” (back when SunOS ruled the world) to determine the most efficient route for the elevator to take.

The parameter they gave it to measure was “how long does each wait to get to their floor”. So it optimized for that and found it could get it down to 0 by never letting anyone get on, so they never got to their floor, so their wait time was unset (which = 0).

They tweaked the parameters to ensure everyone got to their floor and as far as I can tell it worked well. I never had to wait much for an elevator.