AI doomsday warnings a distraction from the danger it already poses, warns expert

L4sBot@lemmy.worldmod to Technology@lemmy.world – 182 points – AI doomsday warnings a distraction from the danger it already poses, warns expert
theguardian.com

AI doomsday warnings a distraction from the danger it already poses, warns expert::A leading researcher, who will attend this week’s AI safety summit in London, warns of ‘real threat to the public conversation’

20

You are viewing a single comment
View all commentsShow the parent comment

turning economic power over to unethical AI systems for many years now

What's the difference from unethical human systems?

No ethics based lapses.

Humans in a systemic unethical system can be individually ethical using deception or until the system grinds them to dust.

An unethical ai built on unethical data will reinforce unethical behavior forever.

Then the only recourse is to create ethical constraints. Challenging, but possible, even with current LLM technology.

Folks expect humans to be unethical, and [at least try to] put in checks and balances for it. When it's an AI, on the other hand, lots of folks are too computer-illiterate to treat it as anything but infallible magic.

It's the fact that ethical people can easily create unethical AI. The core problem is reinforcing biases/stereotypes in the data without realizing. Obviously there are other concerns about purposefully doing unethical stuff, but the real issue is that AI/ML just learns from what it's given.

Examples range from cameras that think most people from Asia have their eyes closed https://www.digitaltrends.com/computing/facial-recognition-software-passport-renewal-asian-man-eyes-closed/ to things like Amazon reinforcing gender hiring biases https://www.reuters.com/article/us-amazon-com-jobs-automation-insight-idUSKCN1MK08G

Ultimately even when built "correctly" AI can be extremely dangerous.

Upvote for a good, thought provoking question.

An AI can't be fined or imprisoned.