Both Elon Musk and Sam Altman frequently talk about artificial general intelligence, or AGI, and the possibilities it could bring in the future. However, some experts are not at all convinced that it will ever become a reality. Among them is one of the leading experts on this technology, one of its ‘fathers.’
According to him, talking about artificial general intelligence is a mistake.He argues that this is mainly because it confuses people, who tend to associate tools like ChatGPT with apocalyptic scenarios. That is, a time when AI will have self-awareness and similar things, which many find threatening.
What if Elon Musk and Sam Altman were wrong about AI?
There’s a lot of talk about artificial general intelligence. Among them are high-profile figures such as Elon Musk and Sam Altman, the man behind ChatGPT. However, not everyone agrees with this vision. For example, Yann LeCun, chief AI scientist at Meta and one of the leading deep learning specialists currently in existence.
To begin, it’s worth understanding what artificial general intelligence is. Basically, it refers to a hypothetical AI capable of performing any cognitive task a human can perform. In other words, a technology that is more or less capable of reasoning on its own, without any supervision and making its own decisions.
LeCun believes that thinking about artificial consciousness that could eventually replace humans is far from the reality that exists today, or that could happen in the future. In fact, at a recent NVIDIA event, he admitted that he’s “sick of the term artificial general intelligence,” which keeps coming up all the time .
“AI is destined to become a powerful tool, not an autonomous threat,” LeCun specified. In his view, it’s clear that AI will assist workers in many tasks, especially those that are more repetitive and autonomous, but that it will never replace humans, as Sam Altman or Elon Musk suggest. Among other reasons, because it can’t.
The Limits of AI, Under Debate
Yann LeCun is clear that artificial intelligence is a tool, but it’s far from the revolution it’s often imagined to be. In fact, he’s one of those experts who firmly believes that AI won’t possess human capabilities such as comprehension or the ability to plan long-term.
Their much more pragmatic perspective lies somewhere between those who believe AI will change the world and those (of which there are also some) who dismiss its advances as
complete rubbish . Is it true, once again, that virtue lies somewhere in the middle?