On May 30, a short statement issued by the non-profit Center for AI Safety (Center for AI Safety) caused a sensation in the AI world, causing the status of artificial intelligence to be shaken.
We found the statement on the organization's official website. There are only 22 words in the statement, but it is full of experts' "accusations" against AI: it is necessary to reduce the risk of human extinction that artificial intelligence may cause, and put it on the same level as social issues such as epidemics and nuclear wars, and serve as Global priorities advance.
The initiative has won the support of many AI industry leaders. Up to now, more than 350 executives and experts in the AI field have signed the statement. The main signatories include Google DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis (Demis Hassabis), OpenAI CEO Sam Altman (Sam Altman), "Godfather of AI" Geoffrey Hinton (Geoffrey Hinton) Hinton, 2018 Turing Award winner Youshua Bengio, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei.
ChatGPT sparked an AI craze and continued to raise concerns about the potential risks of the technology. In fact, earlier this year, more than 1,000 industry executives and experts, including Tesla CEO Musk, signed an open letter calling for a six-month moratorium on the development of advanced AI. This event had a certain impact on AI at the time.
1. AI may cause human extinction
AIGC and AGI have swept through almost every field at a rapid speed. However, after the frenzy, people also began to rationally think about whether AI will interfere with human activities. The statements of the above-mentioned executives and experts are not groundless. Their main purpose is to warn that AI may bring extinction risks to human beings.
Dan Hendrycks, executive director of the Center for Artificial Intelligence Security, told The New York Times: "The statement is succinct, does not suggest potential ways to mitigate the threat of artificial intelligence, and is designed to avoid disagreement."
The experts who signed the statement believe that if the development of artificial intelligence is out of control and there is a lack of corresponding countermeasures and management measures, it is likely to lead to the extinction of human beings. This requires relevant companies and humans to remain vigilant and take necessary measures to ensure their safe development.
From the issue of human extinction, we can also extend to how to balance personal interests and social interests, especially AI companies and research institutions, need to avoid too one-sided pursuit of interests and ignore possible impacts.
2. AI is out of control and excessively replaces artificial intelligence
If AI gets out of control, beyond the scope of human understanding and management, it may have catastrophic consequences, which is the most serious situation. In addition, the malicious exploitation or irrational use of technologies triggered by AI out of control can also have devastating results.
Then there is the excessive replacement of artificial intelligence by AI. There are equally devastating risks of mass unemployment and social unrest if artificial intelligence replaces human labor too quickly and extensively.
In terms of warfare, when artificial intelligence is used as a weapon, it may also lead to extinction-level consequences, which require strict restrictions and management. And when artificial intelligence technology is misjudged and biased, it may also lead to disastrous results. This also requires adding necessary controls and oversight during the development process.
3. AI scams emerge in endlessly
Another negative impact on AI is the recent AI fraud. Recently, the Baotou police released a typical case of telecommunications fraud using artificial intelligence (AI). Mr. Guo, the legal representative of a technology company in Fuzhou, was defrauded of 4.3 million yuan within 10 minutes.
At noon on April 20, a friend of Mr. Guo suddenly contacted him via WeChat video. His friend was bidding in another place and needed a deposit of 4.3 million yuan, and he needed to transfer money from a business-to-business account. He wanted to borrow money from Mr. Guo’s company account.
Based on his trust in his friend and the verification of his identity through video chat, Mr. Guo transferred 4.3 million to his friend's bank card in two installments without verifying whether the money had arrived. Mr. Guo didn't know he was cheated until he called his friend. The scammer pretended to be a friend through intelligent AI face-changing and onomatopoeia technology to defraud him.
Following the previous incident of "being defrauded of 4.3 million yuan by AI face-changing in 10 minutes", on May 22, another AI face-changing fraud occurred, this time the amount was as high as 1.32 million, and the entire fraud process took only 9 seconds.
On May 22, Mr. He from Anqing, Anhui received a video call from an acquaintance and asked him to help transfer an account. But 9 seconds later, the other party quickly hung up the phone on the grounds that they were "in a meeting" and said, "we can't talk about WeChat and phone, add QQ."
"Because I made a video call and I was an acquaintance, I transferred the money without thinking too much." Mr. He said when recalling his experience of being cheated.
4. What can we do in the face of AI fraud?
In the face of AI fraud, what can we do to deal with it? You can refer to the following measures: reduce the exposure of your own photos, audio and video, and prevent them from being collected by scammers for AI face changing or onomatopoeia. In addition, when communicating with the other party, you can ask for information that is commonly known. The real information is adulterated with false information, so that the other party can communicate with you more to see if there are any flaws.
Ask the other party to make more facial expressions or body language during the video to see if there is any distortion. Observe the eyes of the other party in the video call. Most fake faces are synthesized from photos with eyes open. Fake faces rarely even blink. The lack of blinking is a good way to judge whether a video is real or fake. Pay attention to abnormal phenomena such as the synchronization of voice and lip movement, inconsistent emotions, blurred traces, picture pauses or discoloration, these may be traces of AI face changing.
In short, preventing the risks of artificial intelligence requires the joint efforts of the whole society. The government, enterprises, and individuals all need to play their own roles to ensure the safe and controllable development of artificial intelligence through scientific management, safety precautions, cognitive improvement, and human development.
5. User evaluation: The AI world once again collectively brushes up the sense of presence
Regarding this matter, some netizens believe that human beings may eventually be extinct by robots created by themselves, and some netizens believe that this is absolutely impossible. Since human beings have expected it, there must be preventive measures.
Objective and sober netizens believe that this is another time for the AI community to gain a sense of presence and attract people's attention. Don't take it too seriously. At least if domestic research really stops, it will fall into the pit.
Some netizens pointed out that the study of controllable, explainable, trustworthy, and safe artificial intelligence is of course worthy of attention, but it is really a ridiculous metaphor to raise the severity of AI extinction to the same level as epidemics and nuclear weapons.
However, some netizens believe that the release of this statement is generally a good thing, making more people aware of the potential risks of AI, and it is necessary to formulate regulatory policies as soon as possible.
6. Write at the end: What do the experts think?
The day before yesterday, Google CEO Sundar Pichai (Sundar Pichai) met with EU officials in Brussels to discuss AI policy. His view was relatively neutral: "Technology needs to be properly regulated without stifling innovation."
Sam Altman is probably the most interesting signatory on the list, which is a bit ironic after all the company has done more to bring AI to the real world than almost any other company.
Since ChatGPT exploded in late 2022, Altman has repeatedly said that the future of artificial intelligence has taken him by surprise, while "bragging" how much better artificial intelligence will make the world.
Now, he has signed the open letter, and the different words and actions before and after it really make people feel a little contradictory.
Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates has warned that artificial intelligence assistants could soon revolutionize users' online behaviour, obsoleting search engines such as Google and Amazon.
"With an AI personal agent, you're not going to search the web, you're not browsing Amazon."
AI assistants can "read things you don't have time to read," he said, allowing users to access information without using search engines such as Google.
Friends, what do you think of this statement? Do you think AI will cause human extinction?