Google DeepMind’s CEO Demis Hassabis recently said something that sounds as exciting as it is frightening. He said that Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) with human-like thinking is now just a few years away. At an event at Stanford Graduate School of Business, he said, ‘Perhaps 2030, give or take a year or two.’ He himself is surprised to hear this. Hassabis compared AGI to ‘singularity’, meaning that moment from which there will be no looking back. According to him, this will be the beginning of ‘a new human era’. And that’s why he repeatedly says that preparation to face the new era should start now because time is running out. Hassabis is not the only one saying such things. OpenAI’s CEO Sam Altman says that millions of jobs could be lost due to AI. Anthropic’s CEO Dario Amodei has even said that half of entry-level white-collar jobs could disappear in the next five years. Yes, it is also true that in recent days all these stalwarts have softened their ‘doomsday language’ a bit, but the main message remains the same. Hassabis also acknowledged that some of his colleagues become ‘too certain’ in their predictions. This is not right. He did not describe AGI as merely synonymous with danger. According to him, this same technology can bring revolution in medical science. It can be the reason for economic transformation and can lay the foundation of a world where the meaning of the word ‘scarcity’ changes, which futurists call a ‘post-scarcity world’. His direct message to youth and students is – whether you are studying ‘Humanities’ or taking training in Science-Technology, don’t run away from this technology, embrace it. He said the most interesting thing, ‘The future is not yet written, but the next few years will determine what it will actually look like.’ AGI – When machines will also be proficient in every task like humans AGI means Artificial General Intelligence. This is that level of AI when a machine can perform every task with capability equal to or even better than humans. Current AI is proficient in one specific task, AGI will be proficient in every task. Hassabis estimates that this could become reality by 2030. Sam Altman and Dario Amodei have also indicated around this same timeline. Potential benefits of AGI – cure for diseases, economic transformation, a world free from scarcity. But along with this, concerns like job losses, questions of control, and unpredictable impacts on society are also associated. The world perhaps doesn’t even have five years to prepare.
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