Elon Musk wary that Artificial Intelligence would outdate mankind

By: News Desk |
February 16, 2017 4:49 pm

Technology is evolving at a fast pace and Tesla is one organisation that is leading the trends in terms of the development of artificial intelligence (AI). As the organisation steadfast towards its aim of exploring the high tides of AI, its visionary leader Elon Musk has asked the mankind to remain cautious of the tremendous potential that this revolutionary technology possesses.

Musk was at the World Government Summit 2017 in Dubai when he expressed his concerns about AI outdating human intelligence. He said that the humans would have to merge with the machines to avoid becoming irrelevant in the age of AI. “Some high bandwidth interface to the brain will be something that helps achieve a symbiosis between human and machine intelligence and maybe solves the control problem and the usefulness problem,” he said.

Musk explained that while humans can process about 10 bits per second while typing on a mobile phone, AI, on the other hand, can communicate at a speed of a ‘trillion bits per second’. “It’s mostly about the bandwidth, the speed of the connection between your brain and the digital version of yourself, particularly output,” Musk explained.

“Over time I think we will probably see a closer merger of biological intelligence and digital intelligence,” he added.

Musk said that the AI researchers need to remain careful in the ways they adopt this technology. “Sometimes what will happen is a scientist will get so engrossed in their work that they don’t really realise the ramifications of what they’re doing,” he noted.

During his session, Musk touched upon his fear of “deep AI”, which he described is “smarter than the smartest human on earth”.

Musk said that the extent of growth of AI can be seen in the driverless cars that are being developed at a much faster rate than the other AI-based technologies. “But there are many people whose jobs are to drive. In fact, I think it might be the single largest employer of people … Driving in various forms. So we need to figure out new roles for what do those people do, but it will be very disruptive and very quick,” he said.