2024-01-15 20:45:31
According to AI experts, there is a universe in which this new technology will solve all our problems, and another where it will end the existence of the human species.
Throughout 2023, we have seen speculation oscillate between these two scenarios, and there is little doubt that 2024 will continue on this same path. After all, it has been almost a decade since “stars” like Elon Musk and Stephen Hawking talked about how “artificial intelligence could end humanity.” The whole question is therefore whether we are really any closer to it today.
In a post published last April, computer scientists Scott Aaronson and Boaz Barak, from the University of Texas and Harvard University, narrowed down the futuristic scenarios to just five – and if one was the classic dystopia in which humanity no longer has a place, another scenario was one where AI progress… was content to stagnate.
This is indeed a possibility that we perhaps don’t talk about often enough, summarized New Scientist in December. “The march of AI could be stopped by its voracious demand for resources.” One could, for example, imagine that the amount of electricity and water needed to run and cool the amount of computer servers required “leads to a moratorium on the development” of AI. Or, “we could run out of data to train future models,” which would mean the technology would never reach the level needed to realize all of its promises.
Between the scenario of destruction and that of stagnation, there remains that of utopia. This is Barak and Aaronson’s “Futurama” scenario, in which tomorrow’s civilization differs significantly from ours, but in a positive sense. “AI is being used to reduce poverty and ensure that a greater portion of humanity has access to food, healthcare, education and economic opportunities. There might be problems, caused by human misdeeds or neglect, but the people of this planet would be happier overall.” We will perhaps see more clearly at the end of 2024…
1705358650
#Artificial #intelligence #scenarios