That the conversation around a bot research project could so quickly spin out of control illustrates what a lightning rod artificial intelligence has become.

Even tech titans of Silicon Valley are divided about a future integrated with AI.

Elon Musk recently put forth his own doomsday scenario. "I have exposure to the most cutting edge AI, and I think people should be really concerned by it," says Musk, speaking to a roomful of governors last month.

"AI is a fundamental risk to the existence of human civilization in a way that car accidents, airplane crashes, faulty drugs or bad food were not they were harmful to a set of individuals within society, of course, but they were not harmful to society as a whole," he says.

Batra's boss, Mark Zuckerberg, calls such fearful warnings "irresponsible."

"I have pretty strong opinions on this. I am optimistic," says Zuckerberg. "I think you can build things and the world gets better. But with AI especially, I am really optimistic. And I think people who are naysayers and try to drum up these doomsday scenarios I just, I don't understand it. It's really negative and in some ways I actually think it is pretty irresponsible."

See also:

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg: Elon Musk's doomsday AI predictions are 'pretty irresponsible'

Elon Musk: 'Robots will be able to do everything better than us'

Warren Buffett and Bill Gates think it's 'crazy' to view job-stealing robots as bad

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The Facebook chatbot controversy highlights how paranoid people are about life with robots and AI - CNBC