{"id":1508296,"date":"2024-12-16T23:25:00","date_gmt":"2024-12-17T04:25:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/?p=1508296"},"modified":"2024-12-16T23:25:00","modified_gmt":"2024-12-17T04:25:00","slug":"autonomous-ai-poses-existential-threat-and-its-almost-here-former-google-ceo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/autonomous-ai-poses-existential-threat-and-its-almost-here-former-google-ceo\/1508296\/","title":{"rendered":"Autonomous AI Poses Existential Threat – And It’s Almost Here: Former Google CEO"},"content":{"rendered":"

Autonomous AI Poses Existential Threat – And It’s Almost Here: Former Google CEO<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Authored by Joseph Lord via The Epoch Times<\/a> (emphasis ours),<\/em><\/p>\n

Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt said that autonomous artificial intelligence (AI) is coming\u2014and that it could pose an existential threat to humanity.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Google Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt testifies before the Senate Judiciary Committee’s Antitrust, Competition Policy and Consumer Rights Subcommittee on Capitol Hill, in Washington, D.C., on Sept. 21, 2011. Chip Somodevilla\/Getty Images<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re soon going to be able to have computers running on their own, deciding what they want to do<\/strong>,\u201d Schmidt, who has long raised alarm about both the dangers and the benefits AI poses to humanity, said during a Dec. 15 appearance on ABC\u2019s \u201cThis Week.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s a dangerous point: When the system can self improve, we need to seriously think about unplugging it,<\/strong>\u201d Schmidt said.<\/p>\n

Schmidt is far from the first tech leader to raise these concerns.<\/p>\n

The rise of consumer AI products like ChatGPT has been unprecedented in the past two years, with major improvements to the language-based model. Other AI models have become increasingly adept at creating visual art, photographs, and full-length videos that are nearly indistinguishable from reality in many cases.<\/p>\n

For some, the technology calls to mind the \u201cTerminator\u201d series, which centers on a dystopian future where AI takes over the planet, leading to apocalyptic results.<\/p>\n

For all the fears that ChatGPT and similar platforms have raised, consumer AI services available today still fall into a category experts would consider \u201cdumb AI.\u201d These AI are trained on a massive set of data, but lack consciousness, sentience, or the ability to behave autonomously.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Schmidt and other experts are not particularly worried about these systems.<\/p>\n

Rather, they\u2019re concerned about more advanced AI, known in the tech world as \u201cartificial general intelligence\u201d (AGI), describing far more complex AI systems that could have sentience and, by extension, could develop conscious motives independent from and potentially dangerous to human interests.<\/p>\n

Schmidt said no such systems exist today yet, and we\u2019re rapidly moving toward a new, in-between type of AI: one lacking the sentience that would define an AGI, and still able to act autonomously in fields like research and weaponry.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve done this for 50 years. I\u2019ve never seen innovation at this scale<\/strong>,\u201d Schmidt said of the rapid developments in AI complexity.<\/p>\n

Schmidt said that more developed AI would have many benefits to humanity\u2014and could have just as many \u201cbad things like weapons and cyber attacks.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Challenge<\/h2>\n

The challenge, Schmidt said, is multifaceted.<\/p>\n

At a core level, he repeated a common sentiment among tech leaders: if autonomous AGI-like systems are inevitable, it will require massive cooperation among both corporate interests and governments internationally to avoid potentially devastating consequences.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s easier said than done. AI provides U.S. competitors like China, Russia, and Iran with a potential leg-up over the United States that would be difficult to achieve otherwise.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Within the tech industry as well, there\u2019s currently massive competition among major corporations\u2014Google, Microsoft, and others\u2014to outcompete rivals, a situation that raises inherent risks of improper security protocols for dealing with a rogue AI, Schmidt said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe competition is so fierce, there\u2019s a concern that one of the companies will decide to omit the [safety] steps and then somehow release something that really does some harm<\/strong>,\u201d Schmidt said. Such harms would only become evident after the fact, he said.<\/p>\n

The challenge is greater on the international stage, where adversarial nations are likely to see the new technology as revolutionary for their efforts to challenge U.S. global hegemony and expand their own influence.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Chinese are clever, and they understand the power of a new kind of intelligence for their industrial might, their military might, and their surveillance system,\u201d Schmidt said.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s a bit of a catch-22 for U.S. leaders in the field, who find themselves forced to balance existential concerns for humanity with the potential for the United States to fall behind its adversaries, which could be catastrophic to global stability.<\/p>\n

In the worst case, such systems could be used to engineer crippling biological and nuclear weapons, particularly by terror groups like ISIS.<\/strong><\/p>\n

For this reason, Schmidt said, it\u2019s absolutely crucial that the United States continue to innovate in the field, and ultimately maintain technological dominance over China and other adversarial states and groups.<\/p>\n

Industry Leaders Demand Regulation<\/h2>\n

Regulation of the field remains insufficient, Schmidt said. But he expects that governments\u2019 focus on enhancing safeguards around the tech will accelerate dramatically in the coming years.<\/p>\n

Asked by anchor George Stephanopoulos if governments were doing enough to regulate it, Schmidt replied, \u201cNot yet, but they will, because they’ll have to.\u201d<\/p>\n

Despite some initial interest in the field\u2014hearings, legislative proposals, and other initiatives\u2014emerging during the current 118th Congress, this session seems to be on track to end without any major legislation related to AI.<\/p>\n

President-elect Donald Trump, for his part, has warned of the vast risks posed by AI, saying during an appearance on Logan Paul\u2019s \u201cImpaulsive\u201d podcast that it\u2019s \u201creally powerful stuff.\u201d<\/p>\n

He also spoke of the need to maintain competitiveness with adversaries.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt brings with it difficulty, but we have to be at the forefront,\u201d<\/strong> Trump said. \u201cIt\u2019s going to happen, and if it\u2019s going to happen, we have to take the lead over China. China\u2019s the primary threat.\u201d<\/p>\n

Schmidt\u2019s takes on both the benefits and the challenges of the technology aligns with other industry reactions.<\/p>\n

In June 2024, OpenAI and Google employees signed a letter<\/a> warning of \u201cserious risks\u201d posed by AI, and calling for greater government oversight of the field.<\/p>\n

Elon Musk has put forward<\/a> similar warnings, saying that Google is seeking to create a \u201cdigital God\u201d through its DeepMind AI program.<\/p>\n

In August, these concerns intensified after it was discovered<\/a> that an AI took autonomous action to avoid being shut down\u2014raising fears that humanity is already losing control over its creation as governments remain inactive.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Tyler Durden<\/a><\/span>
\nMon, 12\/16\/2024 – 18:25<\/span><\/p>\n

\u200bhttps:\/\/www.zerohedge.com\/technology\/autonomous-ai-poses-existential-threat-and-its-almost-here-former-google-ceo<\/a>\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Autonomous AI Poses Existential Threat – And It’s Almost Here: Former Google CEO Authored by Joseph Lord via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours), Former Google…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":1508297,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1508296","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","wpcat-1-id"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pbimBl-6knm","jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2024\/12\/image2879729_0-IiDyyZ.jpeg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1508296","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1508296"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1508296\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1508297"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1508296"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1508296"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1508296"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}