Elon Musk and dozens of other technology leaders have urged AI labs to halt development of systems capable of competing with human intelligence.
In an open letter signed by Musk, Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, and 2020 presidential candidate Andrew Yang, the Future of Life Institute urged AI labs to stop training models more powerful than GPT-4, the latest version of the large language model software developed by U.S. startup OpenAI.
“As modern AI systems become human-competitive at general tasks, we must ask ourselves: Should we allow machines to flood our information channels with propaganda and untruth?” the letter stated.
“Should we automate all jobs, including the most fulfilling ones? Should we create nonhuman minds that will eventually outnumber, outsmart, replace, and outnumber us? Should we take the risk of losing control of our civilization?”
“Such decisions must not be delegated to unelected tech leaders,” the letter continued.
ChatGPT, the popular AI chatbot, has astounded researchers with its ability to respond to user prompts in humanlike fashion. ChatGPT had 100 million monthly active users by January, only two months after its launch, making it the fastest-growing consumer application in history.
The technology is trained on massive amounts of data from the internet and has been used to create everything from William Shakespeare-style poetry to legal opinions on court cases.
However, AI ethicists are concerned about potential misuses of the technology, such as plagiarism and misinformation.
