ChatGPT is giant AI. There are others of its ilk such as Bard, Chinchilla, PaLM, LaMDA. There are general AI systems. The CEOs of three leading AI companies have signed a statement (issued by Centre for AI safety — CAIS) forewarning of the ‘extinction’ risk posed by AI. These CEOS are Sam Altman from Open AI, Denis Hassabis from DeepMind, and Dario Amodel from Anthropic. They compare AI risks to risks with a nuclear war or a pandemic. It is a global priority to mitigate this risk. Among the signatories are Geoffrey Hinton and Youshua Bengio. All signatures have been verified.

AI, as we know, is a transformative force. We should realise the risks, opportunities and downsides associated with it.

Warnings against AI come thick and fast. Majority of the US population believes that AI could threaten civilization.

Big Tech pour big money into AI development. They are in a hurry to introduce new AI products.

Governments are contemplating regulation of AI. Europe pushes for an AI Act.

There could be AI systems. In the coming years, fear mongering could bring about many tools to protect against them. It is all about how we see AI in our imagination. It is necessary to dissociate AI from the fictional stories in the movies and TV serials and engage with its actual functioning.

AI has the potential to solve some of the world’s most pressing problems — climate change, disease and poverty. It improves the quality of decision making, and the quality of life itself. Instead of fearing AI, we should focus on using it for the greater good.