Elon Musk among experts calling for pause on AI due to ‘profound risks’
Topics: Elon Musk, Technology, Science
Anish Vij
Featured Image Credit: Alamy/PA Images/Science Photo Library
Topics: Elon Musk, Technology, Science
Like him or loathe him, Elon Musk is one of the most innovate minds of the past decade.
However, the mind behind Tesla and SpaceX is now part of a group of tech chiefs who want to pause the development of artificial intelligence (AI).
The likes of Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak and Skype co-founder Jaan Tallinn, have signed an open letter demanding that all labs training AI systems stop for at least six months.
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US tech firm OpenAI released its latest version of AI chatbot ChatGPT earlier this month - after it was officially launched last year.
The bot can respond to questions in a human-like manner and understand the context of follow-up queries, much like in human conversations.
It can even admit its own mistakes or reject inappropriate requests.
Most importantly, ChatGPT broke the record to become the fastest-growing user base ever and reportedly reached over 100 million active users in January this year.
But is there a risk attached to the rapid growth of AI?
Well, it seems that Musk and his tech buddies are cautious about how quickly the software is becoming 'human competitive at general tasks', as documented in their letter.
"Recent months have seen AI labs locked in an out-of-control race to develop and deploy ever more powerful digital minds that no-one – not even their creators – can understand, predict or reliably control," the letter reads.
"Powerful AI systems should be developed only once we are confident that their effects will be positive and their risks will be manageable."
They have called for researchers to focus on making sure the technology is accurate, safe and transparent.
The letter added: “Humanity can enjoy a flourishing future with AI. Having succeeded in creating powerful AI systems, we can now enjoy an ‘AI summer’ in which we reap the rewards, engineer these systems for the clear benefit of all and give society a chance to adapt.
“Society has hit pause on other technologies with potentially catastrophic effects on society.
“We can do so here. Let’s enjoy a long AI summer, not rush unprepared into a fall.”
According to OpenAI, new software GPT-4 has 'more advanced reasoning skills' than ChatGPT but, like its predecessors, is still not fully reliable and may 'hallucinate' – a phenomenon where AI invents facts or makes reasoning errors.
iRobot is looking more and more real each day.