The rapid growth of advanced artificial intelligence, spurred in part by OpenAI’s chatbot, ChatGPT, pushed some tech industry leaders last week to call for a six-month ban on further development of the technology. Apple cofounder Steve Wozniak and Tesla chief Elon Musk were among those who signed the letter supporting the temporary suspension.
But ex–Google CEO Eric Schmidt, who has previously warned about the risks of using A.I., said that he wouldn’t support a pause in its development. His reason? A pause would help other countries gain an edge.
“I’m not in favor of a six-month pause, because it will simply benefit China,” Schmidt told the Australian Financial Review on Thursday. “What I am in favor of is getting everybody together ASAP to discuss what are the appropriate guardrails.”
The proposed moratorium asks companies to stop development of complex A.I. systems for six months to address concerns over misuse and the “profound risks to society and humanity.” Some leaders, such as Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai, have said they won’t comply with the call to pause, stating that he supports regulation rather than a hiatus.
According to Schmidt, we may not be able to make sense of the threats from A.I. just yet, which could pose a challenge in itself.
“I think the concerns could be understated. I think…things could be worse than people are saying. You have a scenario here where you have these large language models that, as they get bigger, have emergent behavior we don’t understand,” he noted, referring to companies in the tech sector that are working on A.I. advancements.
Schmidt’s remarks come at a time when tools like ChatGPT and Midjourney, an A.I. image-generator, have set off an A.I. revolution worldwide. Companies like Google, Meta, and Microsoft have been scrambling to get a read on what’s next in the A.I. frontier, as have Chinese firms like Baidu. Ernie Bot, a chatbot akin to ChatGPT, was a letdown for Chinese investors when it was launched in March, leading to Baidu losing $3 billion in market value. But that hasn’t stopped the company from subsequently improving its chatbot capabilities.
“It is not perfect yet, so why do we need to launch it today?” Baidu CEO Robin Li said at the launch event. “Because the market demands it.”
A.I. alarm bells
Part of the appeal of (and concern over) A.I. is that it’s been widely adopted—by the average person for writing essays and planning vacations, as well as by large financial institutions to support professional roles such as helping financial advisors do research. And as A.I. platforms become more commonplace, Schmidt, like other experts, has voiced concerns about the need for regulation in this space.
“I think today the government’s response would be clumsy because there are very few people in government who understand this stuff. So I’m in favor of letting the industry try to get its act together,” Schmidt said, suggesting that businesses create their own voluntary guidelines. “This is a case where you don’t rush in unless you understand what you’re doing.”
One of Schmidt’s biggest concerns is that A.I. systems become more complicated than people can fully comprehend, but companies, nevertheless, continue to introduce new products.
“You can get [into] a situation where it’s a race to the bottom…and we rush to release without knowing what we’re doing,” he told the AFR.
The former Google chief is also worried about the potential exploitation of A.I. in things like cybercrime if safeguards aren’t imposed. In recent weeks, fake A.I.-generated images of the Pope in a puffer jacket have been making the rounds online, showing people how effective and how dangerous A.I. has become. There have also been growing concerns over A.I. text tools being used to plagiarize work in schools and universities.
Schmidt, who coauthored a book about the A.I. revolution in 2021, has repeatedly cautioned that if the industry lacks frameworks for how to work with this technology, it could have dire consequences for society and the democratic system. But he has also acknowledged the benefits of using A.I. to upgrade antiquated technologies in the military and helping improve education.
“Imagine a world where you have an A.I. tutor that increases the educational capability of everyone in every language globally. These are remarkable,” Schmidt said in an interview with ABC News last week.
