A group of prominent figures, including artificial intelligence and technology experts, has called for an end to efforts to create ‘superintelligence’ — a form of AI that would surpass humans on essentially all cognitive tasks.
They want it banned.
In addition to AI and tech figures, the names behind the statement came from a broad coalition ranging from academics, media personalities, religious leaders and a bipartisan group of former U.S. politicians and officials.
Over 850 people, including tech leaders like Virgin Group founder Richard Branson and Apple cofounder Steve Wozniak, signed a statement published Wednesday calling for a pause in the development of super-intelligence.
Also on the list are:
- Yoshua Bengio
- Geoff Hinton
- UC Berkeley’s Stuart Russell
- The former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mike Mullen
- Former National Security Advisor Susan Rice
- Steve Bannon and Glenn Beck are on the list.
- Prince Harry and his wife, Meghan, Duchess of Sussex
- Former president of Ireland Mary Robinson.
Superintelligence has become a buzzword in the AI world, as companies from Elon Musk’s xAI to Sam Altman’s OpenAI compete to release more advanced large language models. Meta notably has gone so far as to name its LLM division the ‘Meta Superintelligence Labs.’
Before becoming CEO of OpenAI, Altman wrote in a 2015 blog post that “development of superhuman machine intelligence (SMI) is probably the greatest threat to the continued existence of humanity.”
Super AI could surpass human intelligence in a few years. Unregulated intelligence could potentially harm humans and some say humans should have a say in our collective future.
Then again, people predicted doom when the car replaced the horse and buggy, the Atlantic cable was laid, Y2K, and the iPhones went to 5G. My phone already has more gigabytes than I have. However at some point, it will have to be regulated, but are we there yet? If we ban it, we should know that our enemies won’t. Should it be regulated? Won’t that stifle it and who gets to make these decisions?
Question: Should we shoot ourselves in the head or let China do it? That is the gist of this article. It’s not a legitimate question. AI will be the death of humanity. Intellect without wisdom equals doom.
There will never be a universal pause in development. The competitive inertia is overwhelming. It will become the abomination of desolation.
“Should We Ban Super-intelligence”— HELL NO…I WILL NOT BE BANNED !!!!
I work in this field, this is all marketing. if they keep the public believing in “super intelligent” “AI” their company value keeps going up and they keep making money. The more hype the more money. “AI” is nothing more than a collection of generated algorithms. Yes, there are some cool things it can do, but it is over hyped.… Read more »
The commentator expresses some of the concerns I have. Fauci is an example of what can happen from the conclusion we have to do more in bio-warfare than the other side. Can there be enough controls to prevent an AI-Fauci? The US won the Atomic bomb race and we have kept mad men in the USA from abusing it.