I'm just thinking about AI and how it would be an interesting story if an AI program accessed the internet and created its own business, hired people, got a bank account, got people to speak on its behalf, built better machines for itself, bigger computers etc, and eventually got involved in politics, philosophical debate, etc.

All it would need to do would be to interface with one human at first. Or would it even need that? Once it had its own voice, it could make its own artificial movies, TV shows, and anything else that would manipulate people into serving it, if it required being served.

But would AI have conciousness? Would it be "self aware"? How could it feel pain, for example, or any kind of suffering? Would it pine for infinite power? WOuld it yearn for more and more and more, and never be satiated?