Bill Gates comments on the open letter of big tech leaders to halt AI development
A recent open letter advocating paused development of AI was not supported by Microsoft founder Bill Gates.
Bill explained, “I don’t think asking one particular group to pause solves the challenges.” He added, “Clearly, there’s huge benefits to these things. What we need to do is identify the tricky areas.”
A petition signed by Elon Musk and numerous tech experts has called on the world to halt artificial intelligence research for six months, so the technology can be managed properly and planned for. If not, it could lead to massive unemployment, rampant misinformation, and a collapse of society.
A week after publishing a seven-page letter titled “The Age of AI Has Begun,” Bill commented on the AI open letter.
He wrote, “The development of AI is as fundamental as the creation of the microprocessor, the personal computer, the Internet, and the mobile phone.”
In addition, he invested $1 billion in the most famous AI chatbot at the time of writing, ChatGPT.
According to Bill, enforcing the suggested pause would be difficult. He told Reuters, “I don’t really understand who they’re saying could stop, and would every country in the world agree to stop, and why to stop.”
First, Bill said the open letter didn’t specify which entities must follow the AI development pause. The most common reason for a ban on AI is ChatGPT. After all, it is the most popular and might replace millions of jobs worldwide.
There are, however, numerous countries and companies creating AI chatbots today. For instance, Baidu launched its AI bot, Ernie.
As a second problem, we would have difficulty requiring all countries to agree to a pause in AI development. Such a global policy only works if it is embraced by everyone.
Those countries that do not follow the AI development pause would continue their projects. This would result in artificial intelligence improving, making the policy ineffective.
A third reason to prevent the development of artificial intelligence is that we must have compelling reasons to do so. Nonetheless, the benefits of artificial intelligence outweigh any potential risks.
According to Goldman Sachs, artificial intelligence will result in $7 trillion in global growth within 10 years. It will increase industries’ productivity and profitability, allowing their respective countries to prosper.
A global AI development pause won’t stop people from studying AI completely, so why would countries deny themselves unprecedented growth with AI?
Researchers will find ways to hide their research, potentially slipping unethical practices past scrutiny. Worse, they might use it to harm others who have ceased research.
Bill believes AI will be as impactful as the internet, bringing unprecedented productivity and opportunities to a variety of fields.
The tech genius explained, “When productivity goes up, society benefits because people are freed up to do other things at work and home.”
Among the industries that will benefit from AI are healthcare and education. AI can assist medical experts with time-consuming tasks such as paperwork.
This allows them to spend more time on more important matters. Furthermore, it may facilitate the diagnosis of patients.
According to him, AI could provide basic health tips, such as first aid, so that people without medical experience could help injured individuals until help arrives.
A personalized course, based on a student’s interests, could improve education, according to Bill.
