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OpenAI cofounder and CEO Sam Altman detailed steps that the private and public sectors should take to ensure that a \u201cdemocratic AI\u201d will prevail over an \u201cauthoritarian AI\u201d model.<\/p>\n
In a Washington Post<\/em> op-ed<\/a> Thursday, he said control of artificial intelligence is the \u201curgent question of our time\u201d and means the world must confront a strategic choice.<\/p>\n \u201cWill it be one in which the United States and allied nations advance a global AI that spreads the technology\u2019s benefits and opens access to it, or an authoritarian one, in which nations or movements that don\u2019t share our values use AI to cement and expand their power?\u201d Altman wrote.<\/p>\n \u201cThere is no third option\u2014and it\u2019s time to decide which path to take. The United States currently has a lead in AI development, but continued leadership is far from guaranteed. Authoritarian governments the world over are willing to spend enormous amounts of money to catch up and ultimately overtake us.\u201d <\/p>\n He noted that Russian President Vladimir Putin has said the winner of the AI race<\/a> will \u201cbecome the ruler of the world\u201d and that China plans to lead the world in AI by 2030.<\/p>\n Not only will such regimes use AI to perpetuate their own hold on power, but they can also use the technology to threaten others, Altman warned.<\/p>\n If authoritarians grab the lead in AI, they could force companies in the U.S. and elsewhere to share user data and use the technology to develop next-generation cyberweapons, he said.<\/p>\n To prevent that from happening, he called for a U.S.-led global coalition and new strategies, highlighting four key steps:<\/p>\n \u201cWhile identifying the right decision-making body is important, the bottom line is that democratic AI has a lead over authoritarian AI because our political system has empowered U.S. companies, entrepreneurs and academics to research, innovate and build,\u201d Altman said.<\/p>\n Unless the democratic vision prevails, the world won\u2019t be cause to maximize the technology\u2019s benefits and minimize its risks, he added. <\/p>\n \u201cIf we want a more democratic world, history tells us our only choice is to develop an AI strategy that will help create it, and that the nations and technologists who have a lead have a responsibility to make that choice\u2014now.\u201d<\/p>\n Altman\u2019s op-ed comes weeks after OpenAI\u00a0announced<\/a>\u00a0retired U.S. Army Gen. Paul Nakasone\u2019s appointment to the board\u2019s new\u00a0safety and security committee<\/a>.<\/p>\n That drew withering criticism from NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden<\/a>, who warned, \u201cDo not ever trust OpenAI or its products.\u201d<\/p>\n Meanwhile, others like Elon Musk<\/a> have said that OpenAI abandoned its original purpose of developing AI that would benefit all of humanity to pursue commercial success instead.<\/p>\n Such fears came to head in May, when OpenAI released GPT-4o with a voice option that sounded similar to actor Scarlett Johansson\u2019s.<\/a> She said Altman asked her last September to lend her voice to the system but she declined.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen I heard the released demo, I was shocked, angered and in disbelief that Mr. Altman would pursue a voice that sounded so eerily similar to mine that my closest friends and news outlets could not tell the difference,\u201d Johansson said.<\/p>\n OpenAI said the voice was not Johansson\u2019s but still halted the use of that option.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n