Artificial Intelligence is advancing at a rate that is more alarming than the threat of nuclear war with North Korea, according to Elon Musk. For those of us who cut our teeth on the terror of nuclear armament and nuclear bomb shelters, this is a huge leap in mindset and unfortunately, a lot of this mindset is in charge of legislation in the USA.
Elon Musk is already lobbying for legislation.
How important is it to control the development of AI and do the decision makers in the USA recognize the urgency around this requirement? Articles and studies such as the one published by Deloitte University Press in April 2017 discuss the benefits of AI implementation in government departments but the study does not focus on the kind of alarm bells such as the one raised by Elon Musk recently.
Nobody likes being regulated, but everything (cars, planes, food, drugs, etc) that's a danger to the public is regulated. AI should be too.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 12, 2017
Artificial Intelligence andThe Global Challenges Foundation
At its 2015 conference, The Global Challenges Foundation warned that more governance was required in this field and their 2017 report reiterated not only the need but also the urgency that should be applied to legislation. It's not all gloom and AI doom though. There are some moves toward better governance afoot, with the partnering of institutions, non-profit organizations, governments, and businesses, releasing the 2017 Asilomar Principles. Over a thousand AI researchers world wide have endorsed them already.
AI is a two sided coin. The incredible abilities on offer to ensure better policing, management, freeing up of man hours, security intelligence, medical advances, safer transportation, to name but a few of a wide reaching array of benefits. The downside is something once relegated to science fiction horror stories of robotics gone bad and able to out think human inventors and controllers.
It is this downside that needs careful and strategic planning and it needs it now, not in ten years time, not even next month.
For a quick study on AI watch this concise and fascinating video.
The not for profit organization known at OpenAI is backed by Musk and according to a recent article in The Guardian, AI is already outmaneuvering people in tests requiring strategy.
Investors are already putting money into developing AI that can understand what makes the brain move body parts. This implies The Terminator is en route to reality but possibly without any happy ending.
If you are reading this article on your phone or tablet, think about what you are holding in your hand. My smart phone is certainly smarter than me and constantly outsmarts me. I'm no techno expert but considering that computers were half the size of a city block when I was a child and I am not yet sixty, extrapolate the technological advances of the last fifteen years and you will begin to understand why AI needs urgent regulatory attention. When next your phone beeps a message that you need to update it, remember that you didn't know an update was required - Artificial Intelligence did!
