‘Unchecked AI Use Could Pose Extinction Risk’: Industry Leaders, Researchers Issue Warning

The single-sentence statement was posted on Centre for AI Safety’s website.

The Wire Staff

The single-sentence statement was posted on Centre for AI Safety’s website.

‘unchecked ai use could pose extinction risk’ industry leaders researchers issue warning

New Delhi: Several industry leaders and academics issued a statement on Tuesday advocating for rigorous mitigation of Artificial Intelligence (AI) associated risks.

The single-sentence statement, published on the Centre for AI Safety’s (CAIS) website read: “Mitigating the risk of extinction from AI should be a global priority alongside other societal-scale risks such as pandemics and nuclear war.”

“AI experts, journalists, policymakers, and the public are increasingly discussing a broad spectrum of important and urgent risks from AI. Even so, it can be difficult to voice concerns about some of advanced AI’s most severe risks. The succinct statement below aims to overcome this obstacle and open up discussion. It is also meant to create common knowledge of the growing number of experts and public figures who also take some of advanced AI’s most severe risks seriously,” the CAIS website said.

The open letter was signed by more than 350 AI executives, researchers and engineers including top officials of three leading AI companies: Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, Demis Hassabis, CEO of Google DeepMind; and Dario Amodei, CEO of Anthropic, NDTV reported.

The statement follows the viral success of OpenAI’s ChatGPT, which helped heighten an arms race in the tech industry over artificial intelligence. In response, a growing number of lawmakers, advocacy groups and tech insiders have raised alarms about the potential for a new crop of AI-powered chatbots to spread misinformation and displace jobs, the CNN reported.

“As stated in the first sentence of the signatory page, there are many “important and urgent risks from AI,” not just the risk of extinction; for example, systemic bias, misinformation, malicious use, cyberattacks, and weaponization. These are all important risks that need to be addressed,” CAIS director Dan Hendrycks said in a tweet on Tuesday.

This article went live on May thirty-first, two thousand twenty three, at fourteen minutes past twelve at noon.

The Wire is now on WhatsApp. Follow our channel for sharp analysis and opinions on the latest developments.