AI Godfathers Quarrel Over The Risk Of AI Taking Over Humanity, Again

AI godfathers Geoffrey Hinton and Yann LeCun are quarreling over the risk of AI taking over humanity, yet again.

What Happened: Hinton and LeCun took potshots at each other, with both saying that the other is wrong and just stopping short of calling each other names.

Hinton has long been advocating for a pause in AI development and for strict regulations to govern companies working on this.

See Also: ‘Let’s Open Source Nuclear Weapons Too’: Godfather Of AI Geoffrey Hinton Mocks Fellow AI Godfather’s Attempts To Trivialize Risks Of AI

"Yann LeCun thinks the risk of AI taking over is miniscule. This means he puts a big weight on his own opinion and a miniscule weight on the opinions of many other equally qualified experts," Hinton said.

LeCun immediately retorted, saying, "I just think the assumptions you and those equally qualified experts are making are wrong."

This is not the first time Hinton and LeCun are having a go at each other. Earlier this month, Hinton clapped at LeCun, saying, “Let's open source nuclear weapons too to make them safer,”. He was mocking LeCun’s comments about an open source Skynet being unable to take over.

Hinton and LeCun are considered “Godfathers of AI”, alongside Yoshua Bengio. They were jointly given the 2018 Turing Award, also known as the “Nobel Prize of computing”.

While LeCun has been saying that the risks of AI to humanity are overhyped, Hinton's stance has been the opposite.

"It may be we look back and see this as a kind of turning point when humanity had to make the decision about whether to develop these things further and what to do to protect themselves if they did," Hinton said in an interview on "60 Minutes" on Paramount Global-owned PARA PARAA CBS.

Why It Matters: While the Biden administration has signed an executive order to ensure AI safety, skeptics and industry players alike have been advocating for regulations to safeguard humanity.

Merely days later, Vice President Kamala Harris announced a new AI Safety Institute to set the guidelines and best practices for examining potentially harmful AI systems.

This includes Tesla Inc. TSLA CEO Elon Musk, Microsoft Corp.'s MSFT former and current CEOs Bill Gates and Satya Nadella, and Meta Platforms Inc.'s META Mark Zuckerberg.

In September, Musk called for a “referee” for AI in a meeting of tech leaders in Washington to discuss AI regulations.

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