U.S. media claimed on Monday that a computer scientist known as “the godfather of artificial intelligence” abandoned his position at Google to warn the public about the risks posed by AI.
Who is the Godfather of AI?
AI pioneer Geoffrey Hinton warned that recent developments carried “profound risks to society and humanity” in an interview with The New York Times. Look at how it was five years ago and how it is today, he was quoted as saying in the Monday article. Put the dissimilarity out there in a big way. That’s frightening. Hinton warned that fierce rivalry among tech firms was leading to the reckless deployment of innovative AI technology that threatened employment and sowed disinformation.
According to his comments to the Times, “it is hard to see how you can prevent the bad actors from using it for bad things.” Starting in 2022, tech giant Google and the company behind the widely used AI chatbot ChatGPT, OpenAI, began developing systems that could process far more information.
Hinton told the Times he thought the sheer volume of data being processed by these systems meant they were beginning to rival human intellect. He said to the publication, “Maybe what is going on in these systems is actually a lot better than what is going on in the brain.” Despite AI’s history of helping humans in the workplace, the advent of more sophisticated chatbots like ChatGPT may threaten human employment.
He told the Times that AI not only eliminates “the drudge work” but that “might take away more than that.”The scientist also expressed concern to the Times about the possible spread of disinformation generated by AI, stating that the typical individual would “not be able to know what is true anymore.” According to the Times, Hinton gave Google notice of his departure last month.
Google AI’s head scientist, Jeff Dean, sent a statement thanking Hinton to the American press. “As one of the first companies to publish AI Principles, we remain committed to a responsible approach to AI,” the statement said. Constantly expanding our knowledge of new threats while taking calculated risks is a priority for us.
Tech tycoon Elon Musk and other experts have been advocating for a halt to AI system development since March to ensure their safety. As a result of the introduction of GPT-4, a far more robust version of the technology utilised by ChatGPT, over a thousand individuals, including Musk and Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, signed an open letter calling for its immediate adoption.
Although Hinton did not sign the original letter, he later told The New York Times that researchers shouldn’t “scale this up more until they have understood whether they can control it.”
