The development of amazing AI models like GPT may seem sudden, but it’s not. the founder of Microsoft Bill Gates in his most recent letter on the opportunities and dangers of Artificial Intelligence. “It’s just the latest step in a decades-long effort by computer scientists to develop machines that can see, read, and at least appear to think. It’s not the last step either: artificial intelligence will only improve over time.”

“Artificial intelligence is going to empower people in incredible ways, but I’m especially excited about its potential to make the world a fairer place. AI can help expand access to health care in underserved communities, improve education in the United States and around the world, and even help us avoid a climate catastrophe. Making sure it benefits everyone—not just the well-off—is the priority for my work in AI. As with any new technology, there are legitimate concerns that need to be addressed — and I believe they can be addressed. We need to mitigate the risks so we can make the most of AI’s incredible potential to improve people’s lives.”

Defining Artificial Intelligence

Technically, the term artificial intelligence refers to a model created to solve a specific problem or provide a specific service. What makes ChatGPT work is artificial intelligence. He learns how to converse better, but cannot learn other tasks. In contrast, the term artificial general intelligence (AGI) refers to software that is capable of learning any task or subject. AGI does not exist yet – there is a heated debate in the computer industry about how to create it, and whether it can be created. The development of AI and AGI has been the big dream of the computer industry. For decades, the question has been when computers will be better than humans at anything other than doing calculations. Now, with the arrival of machine learning and massive computing power, sophisticated AIs are a reality and will improve very quickly. I remember the early days of the personal computer revolution, when the software industry was so small that most of us at a conference could fit on the stage. Today it is a global industry. Since a huge part of it is now turning its attention to artificial intelligence, innovations will come much faster than what we experienced after the invention of the microprocessor.

Advances in artificial intelligence will enable the creation of a personal assistant

Soon the pre-AI era will seem as distant as the days when using a computer meant typing at a C:> cursor instead of touching a screen with a finger. Advances in artificial intelligence will enable the creation of a “personal agent/assistant”.

You’ll be able to use natural language to help this assistant with programming, communications and e-commerce, and it will work across all your devices. Due to the cost of training the models and running the calculations, creating a personal assistant is not yet feasible, but thanks to recent advances in artificial intelligence, it is now a realistic goal. Some issues should be resolved: For example, can an insurance company ask your assistant things about you without your permission? If so, how many people will choose not to use it? Assistants across the company will empower employees in new ways. An assistant who understands a particular company will be available for its employees to consult directly and should be present at every meeting so that they can answer questions.

He may be told to be less assertive or encouraged to speak up if he has an opinion. You will need access to sales, support, financing, product programs and company-related data. He should read news related to the industry the company is in. I believe the result will be that workers will become more productive.

When productivity increases, society benefits because people are freed up to do other things, at work and at home. Of course, there are serious questions about what kind of support and retraining people will need. Governments need to help workers move into other roles. But the demand for people helping other people will never go away. The rise of artificial intelligence will free people to do things that software never will — for example, teaching, caring for the sick, and supporting the elderly. Global health and education are two areas where there is a great need and not enough workers to meet those needs. These are areas where AI can help reduce inequality if done right. These should be a key focus of AI work.

Risks and problems with artificial intelligence

You’ve probably read about problems with current AI models. For example, they are not necessarily good at understanding the larger context related to a human’s request, which leads to some strange results. When you ask an AI to create something fantastic, it can do it well. But when you ask for advice about a trip you want to take, it may suggest hotels that don’t exist. This is because the AI ​​doesn’t understand the context of your request well enough to know whether to invent fake hotels or only tell you about real ones that have rooms available. There are other issues, such as artificial intelligence giving wrong answers to math problems because it struggles with abstract reasoning. But none of these are fundamental limitations of artificial intelligence. The developers are working on these, and I think we’ll see them largely fixed in less than two years, and possibly much sooner.

Other concerns are not just technical. For example, there is the threat posed by humans armed with AI. Like most inventions, artificial intelligence can be used for good or evil purposes. Governments need to work with the private sector on ways to reduce risks. Subsequently, there is a chance that the AIs will get out of hand. Could a machine decide that humans are a threat, conclude that its interests are different from ours, or simply stop caring about us? Possibly, but this problem is no more urgent today than it was before the AI ​​developments of the past few months. Super smart AIs are in our future. Compared to a computer, our brain works at a snail’s pace: An electrical signal to the brain moves at 1/100,000th the speed of the signal on a silicon chip! Once programmers can generalize a learning algorithm and run it at the speed of a computer—an achievement that could be a decade or a century away—we’ll have an incredibly powerful AGI. It will be able to do everything a human brain can, but without any practical limits on the size of its memory or the speed at which it can operate. This will be a profound change. These “powerful” AIs, as they are known, will likely be able to determine their own goals. What will those goals be? What if they conflict with humanity’s interests? Should we try to prevent the development of strong artificial intelligence? These questions will become more pressing with time.