KEY POINTS
- Tech giants are looking to take their generative AI tools to the next level.
- Some experts say technology can free people from menial jobs and usher in a new era of creativity.
- But it can also threaten jobs and cause insurmountable social problems.
Height observers believe that in Silicon Valley this is already considered inevitable. But are we ready?
AGI is defined as artificial intelligence with human cognitive abilities, as opposed to narrower artificial intelligence such as – can free people from menial work and open a new era of creativity.
But such a historic paradigm shift could also endanger jobs and cause insurmountable social problems, experts warn.
Previous technological advances from electricity to the internet have brought powerful social change, said Siki Chen, chief executive of San Francisco-based startup Runway.
“But what we are looking at now is the mind itself… For the first time, we can create the mind itself and increase its number in the universe,” he told the AFP news agency.
OpenAI says its new ChatGPT-4 “demonstrates human-level performance” in some tests. Source: AARP / Richard Drew/AP
As a result, the changes will be “several orders of magnitude greater than any other technological change that has ever been in history.”
And such an exciting, frightening shift is “a double-edged sword,” Mr. Chen said, anticipating the use of AGI to fight climate change, for example, but also warning that it is a tool we want to be as much as possible.” manageable.” “
This was the release Late last year, this brought the long-standing idea of AGI one giant leap closer to reality.
OpenAI, the company behind the generative software that poems and computational code on command, an even more powerful version of the technology it runs on, GPT-4, was released this week.
It says that the technology will be able to process not only text, but also images, as well as create more complex content, such as legal complaints or video games.
As such, it “demonstrates human-level performance” in some tests, the company said.
Can AI put an end to “hard work”?
The success of Microsoft-backed OpenAI has sparked an arms race of sorts in Silicon Valley as the tech giants look to take their generative AI tools to the next level, though they remain wary that chatbots will go off the rails.
AI-powered digital assistants from Microsoft and Google can already wrap up meetings, compose emails, build websites, run ad campaigns, and more — giving us an idea of what AGI will be capable of in the future.
“We spend too much time on routine work,” said Jared Spataro, corporate vice president of Microsoft.
With artificial intelligence, Mr. Spataro wants to “rediscover the soul of work,” he said during a Microsoft presentation on Thursday.
Some suggest that artificial intelligence could also cut costs.
British landscape architect Joe Perkins tweeted that he used GPT-4 for a coding project that a “very good” developer told him would cost £5,000 ($6,000) and take two weeks to complete.
“GPT-4 delivered the same thing in 3 hours for $0.11,” he tweeted. “Genuinely confusing.”
But it raises the question of a threat to jobs, as entrepreneur Chen acknowledges that the technology could one day create a startup like him, or even a better version of him.
“How can I make a living and not be homeless?” he asked, adding that he was counting on solutions to come.
existential questions
The ubiquitous artificial intelligence also challenges creative authenticity, as songs, images, art, and more are created by software, not humans.
Will people avoid education, relying instead on software to do the thinking for them?
And who can be trusted to create unbiased, accurate, and adaptable AI across countries and cultures?
AGI is “probably approaching us faster than we can process,” said Sharon Zhou, co-founder of a generative artificial intelligence company.
The technology raises an existential question for humanity, she told AFP.
“If something stronger than us and more intelligent than us appears, what does it mean for us?” Ms. Zhou asked.
– Are we harnessing it? Or is he harnessing us?
The success of Microsoft-backed OpenAI has sparked an arms race of sorts in Silicon Valley as the tech giants look to take their generative AI tools to the next level, though they remain wary that chatbots will go off the rails.
OpenAI has said it plans to gradually build AGI with the goal of benefiting all of humanity, but acknowledged that there are security flaws in the software.
Security is “a process,” OpenAI chief scientist Ilya Sutzkever said in an interview with MIT Technology Review, adding that it is “highly desirable” for companies to “come up with some kind of process that allows for slower releases of models with these completely unprecedented capabilities.”
But for now, Ms Zhou said, slowing down is simply not part of the ethic.
“Power is centered around those who can build it. And they make decisions around it, and they tend to act quickly,” she said.
In her view, the international order itself could be at stake.
“The pressure between the US and China has been enormous,” Ms Zhou said, adding that the AI race is reminiscent of the Cold War era.
“With AGI, there is definitely a risk that if one country catches it faster, it will dominate?” she asks.
“And so I think the fear is not to stop because we can’t lose.”
