An expert’s point of view on a current event. Generative AI was developed largely without government assistance, but its next phase will require government involvement.
Brian Stauffer illustration September 30, 2024, 12:01 AM
It is increasingly probable that the next U.S. presidential term could see the development of Artificial General Intelligence (AGI). If that happens, everything will change, and generative AI—the artificial intelligence which can produce images and text through ChatGPT and other applications—will seem like the Kitty Hawk Flyer compared with the B-21. AGI, possessing cognitive abilities that equal if not exceed a human’s, will be capable of performing virtually all tasks. It will revolutionize the economy, turbocharge scientific discovery, propel the quality of life to unimagined heights, and grant near invulnerability to national security. Humanity stands on the verge of a new, potentially golden era. But AGI could also create a much darker world.
The path that AGI takes will depend in large measure on who develops it, and how. If it is done in the United States, and done responsibly, then its benefits could be immense. This new, novel, and immense intelligence can be brought to bear on a swathe of problems and tasks, leading to the situation where we could eventually see AI models with the capabilities of a Nobel Prize winner assisting sectors ranging from manufacturing to national security. If, however, AGI is inaugurated in Beijing then the situation could be very different, and its effects likely malign. Chinese possession of AGI would give its troops the edge on every battlefield, its businesses the advantage in every market, and its security services the capacity to enforce a level of surveillance and repression that exceeds anything yet attempted by an authoritarian state.
Ylli Bajraktari is the president and CEO of the Special Competitive Studies Project. From 2019 to 2021, he served as the executive director of the U.S. National Security Commission on Artificial Intelligence.
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