Artificially intelligent machines have become more and more widespread and some people already consider them a threat to humanity. This is not what Garry Kasparov believes. During a speech at Def Con which was held in Las Vegas he stated he did not believe that this kind of machines could pose a genuine threat to humanity. Kasparov is open to AI and to its effects.
However he does believe that AI will have a major social impact and that some types of human labor are going to disappear due to machines.
Kasparov and intelligent machines
Kasparov is experienced in playing chess against the computer of IBM also known as Deep Blue.
He also played chess against a great deal of AI machines. According to him, real artificial intelligence dates from very recent years as it is only recently that we managed to build machines with smart enough capabilities. To him, AI basically means a "black box" with the ability to make decisions by itself.
Defeated by a supercomputer
In his speech, Kasparov talked about the two times the Deep Blue AI machine beat him at chess. This happened in 1996 and also in the following year. He stated the smart machine was just an extremely fast computer programmed to defeat the chess players.
"Deep Blue was as intelligent as an alarm clock", that’s what the former chess world champion said, adding that for him it was not the most pleasant experience to be defeated by an alarm clock even though the machine was worth millions.
Will machines replace humans?
The fact that the number of authentically intelligent machines is continuously increasing would not have extremely negative effects on humanity. He motivated that if we look at how similar innovations affected the course of history, we could see that almost all new technologies and innovations were not so bad after all.
He believes that some human jobs are indeed lost at first. However more human jobs can be gained in the long run, jobs that require not only programming skills, but all types of skills and aptitudes. So in Kasparov’s opinion it’s not a negative thing that in the beginning machines may seem to be replacing human jobs.
Positive examples of artificial intelligence?
Kasparov referred to the beneficial effects of artificially smart machines which actually allow people to be more efficient in the workplace, as machines take care of the tasks that people may consider difficult. In the medical field, according to the former world chess player, intelligent systems are able to provide more accurate diagnoses for health conditions. This does not mean the people in the medical field do not play their role, as they act on the diagnoses generated by the machines when treating patients.
