Live data from Hacker News

Elon Musk says Mark Zuckerberg's understanding of AI is 'limited'

money.cnn.com

51–60 of 98 posts

Re: Elon Musk says Mark Zuckerberg's understanding of AI is 'limited'

#51

They're talking past each other because "AI" has become a useless term. Musk's comments are about a potential (maybe conscious) artificial super intelligence and the risks that could come from that if we enable one somehow without understanding the preconditions. Zuckerberg is just talking about "AI" in the sense that machine learning can solve a valuable class of problems. The super intelligence risk could be seriou…

It's not useless as a term but AI has become a catchall for anxiety about the future.

I'll add another set of concerns you see in these discussions.

People know that the current version of predatory Capitalism we've created so far would happily mass unemploy everyone (possibly all the white collar workers reading this much sooner then you think). This would leave no workers and no consumers with money outside of the ultrawealthy.

I agree. I don't trust the current version of capitalism to program these AI of the future. I think they will burn the house down in their greed.

Re: Elon Musk says Mark Zuckerberg's understanding of AI is 'limited'

#52
“It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.”

The possibility of using AI to surveil and manipulate Facebook users (and non-users) on a mass scale (and probably give his presidential campaign a boost along the way) is worth far too much money for Zuckerberg to admit to the potential downsides.

Zuckerberg isn't optimistic about AI, he's optimistic about the money and power AI will grant him.

Re: Elon Musk says Mark Zuckerberg's understanding of AI is 'limited'

#53
post #42

A majority of the experts in AI would side with Zuckerberg on this one. See for example: http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/d-brief/2017/07/18/artific... . It's not that we shouldn't worry about AI, it's that the issue Musk is raising - AI as an existential threat -, is distracting from the real issues.

Was Isaac Asimov being distracted from the real issues as well just a few decades ago? Food for thought :-)

This is not about science fiction. It's about science today and in a near future and its consequence on policies and regulations.

Re: Elon Musk says Mark Zuckerberg's understanding of AI is 'limited'

#54
post #38

They're talking past each other because "AI" has become a useless term. Musk's comments are about a potential (maybe conscious) artificial super intelligence and the risks that could come from that if we enable one somehow without understanding the preconditions. Zuckerberg is just talking about "AI" in the sense that machine learning can solve a valuable class of problems. The super intelligence risk could be seriou…

>Turning on an AI or copying the code for one and spreading it would probably be easiear. What people never mention in any discussion with AI is that the AI will be as limited by physical world as we are. AI It's not just code, it's also the hardware that will run the code. That hardware has theoretical and practical limits, and requires a lot of power. It's not like AI running on some peta/exascale supercomputer wil…

Exactly. And that's one big reason I find so many of these "doomsday" scenarios less than useful. They're largely based on a view of AI that's rooted in science-fiction, not reality.

Re: Elon Musk says Mark Zuckerberg's understanding of AI is 'limited'

#55
post #38

They're talking past each other because "AI" has become a useless term. Musk's comments are about a potential (maybe conscious) artificial super intelligence and the risks that could come from that if we enable one somehow without understanding the preconditions. Zuckerberg is just talking about "AI" in the sense that machine learning can solve a valuable class of problems. The super intelligence risk could be seriou…

>Turning on an AI or copying the code for one and spreading it would probably be easiear. What people never mention in any discussion with AI is that the AI will be as limited by physical world as we are. AI It's not just code, it's also the hardware that will run the code. That hardware has theoretical and practical limits, and requires a lot of power. It's not like AI running on some peta/exascale supercomputer wil…

It's not like AI running on some peta/exascale supercomputer will be able to jump to your laptop and take it over and spread itself to every electronic device in the world

That's exactly a proposed scenario - with the form of "jumping" being any kind of communication. See: The AI Box problem.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AI_box

Re: Elon Musk says Mark Zuckerberg's understanding of AI is 'limited'

#56
post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Was Isaac Asimov being distracted from the real issues as well just a few decades ago? Food for thought :-)

This is not about science fiction. It's about science today and in a near future and its consequence on policies and regulations.

I honestly believe some of Asimov's concerns regarding AIs are not science fiction but rather forward thinking and will eventually happen.

Re: Elon Musk says Mark Zuckerberg's understanding of AI is 'limited'

#57
Here is a pretty good article where many of the players are interviewed in depth.

http://www.vanityfair.com/news/2017/03/elon-musk-billion-dol...

“If you want a picture of A.I. gone wrong, don’t imagine marching humanoid robots with glowing red eyes. Imagine tiny invisible synthetic bacteria made of diamond, with tiny onboard computers, hiding inside your bloodstream and everyone else’s. And then, simultaneously, they release one microgram of botulinum toxin. Everyone just falls over dead.

Re: Elon Musk says Mark Zuckerberg's understanding of AI is 'limited'

#58
post #20
post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm pretty sure noone on planet Earth has a good understanding of AI yet. I stopped reading about "what AI is, what AI isn't" completely.

(noone -> no one)

https://www.quora.com/How-can-I-politely-correct-someones-gr...

Re: Elon Musk says Mark Zuckerberg's understanding of AI is 'limited'

#59

I don't trust Zuckerberg on any issue in which Facebook has much to gain from one side. We all know how much money he'd like to make by having some AI programs follow us around 24/7.

One guy is trying to change the world and one guy is trying enslave it.

When you have the likes of people like Stephen Hawking agreeing with Musk, why wouldn't you listen and be wary. Mark doesn't seem like a very intelligent person, just a very lucky person.

Re: Elon Musk says Mark Zuckerberg's understanding of AI is 'limited'

#60
Musk maybe oversells the state of AI a bit when he says it's potentially an existential threat to mankind - but on the other hand, the advances of the recent years alone are enough to disrupt the daily lives of almost everyone. In that sense, some alarmism might be appropriate, especially considering control of the best machine learning systems will likely be concentrated in the hands of few powerful players.
Post reply on HN