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Elon Musk: The Danger of AI is Much Greater Than Nuclear Warheads. We Need Regulatory Oversight Of AI Development. (youtube.com)
Elon Musk has been vocal about the need for regulation for AI in the past. At SXSW on Sunday, Musk, 46, elaborated his thoughts. We're very close to seeing cutting edge technologies in AI, Musk said. "It scares the hell out of me," the Tesla and SpaceX showrunner said. He cited the example of AlphaGo and AlphaZero, and the rate of advancements they have shown to illustrate his point. He said: Alpha Zero can read the rules of any game and beat the human. For any game. Nobody expected that rate of improvement. If you ask those same experts who think AI is not progressing at the rate that I'm saying, I think you will find their betting average for things like Go and other AI advancements, is very weak. It's not good.
We will also see this with self driving. Probably by next year, self driving will encompass all forms of driving. By the end of next year, it will be at least 100 percent safer than humans. [...] The rate of improvements is really dramatic and we have to figure out some way to ensure that the advent of digital super intelligence is symbiotic with humanity. I think that's the single biggest existential crisis we face, and the most pressing one. I'm not generally an advocate of regulation -- I'm actually usually on the side of minimizing those things. But this is a case, where you have a very serious danger to the public. There needs to be a public body that has insight and oversight to ensure that everyone is developing AI safely. This is extremely important. The danger of AI is much greater than danger of nuclear warheads. By a lot.
We will also see this with self driving. Probably by next year, self driving will encompass all forms of driving. By the end of next year, it will be at least 100 percent safer than humans. [...] The rate of improvements is really dramatic and we have to figure out some way to ensure that the advent of digital super intelligence is symbiotic with humanity. I think that's the single biggest existential crisis we face, and the most pressing one. I'm not generally an advocate of regulation -- I'm actually usually on the side of minimizing those things. But this is a case, where you have a very serious danger to the public. There needs to be a public body that has insight and oversight to ensure that everyone is developing AI safely. This is extremely important. The danger of AI is much greater than danger of nuclear warheads. By a lot.
It isn't hard to imagine run away AI. Scifi is full of it. But I find it hard to imagine that humans will create an institution to prevent that on a worldwide scale before it's too late. Elon is clearly an optimist.
It's only after Hiroshima that nuclear proliferation became an issue. Only after the Netherlands was massively flooded that they started their Deltaworks. Only after big scandals where things go utterly wrong that we start with regulation and enforcement.
So I would be surprised if we - as a species - get this right and survive this one. We're probably too dumb, as most of the posts in this thread illustrate.
At least Musk tries... Jasper
regulating gene research just moved all such gene research underground (or to other less-regulation heavy nations).
Indeed. My daughter is a biotech major at the Univ of California. She was offered internships for this summer by 5 different companies. Many of her classmates received zero offers. Why the difference? She was told explicitly that it was her ability to speak fluent Mandarin. Most gene research is moving to China. Yet another industry in America has been regulated out of existence.