Godfather of AI resigns from Google and is filled with regret

The ‘Godfather of Artificial Intelligence’ has sensationally resigned from Google, warning that the technology could turn life as we know it upside down.

Geoffrey Hinton, 75, is credited with creating the technology that became the foundation of AI systems like ChatGPT and Google Bard.

But the Turing Prize winner now says part of him regrets helping to create the systems, which he fears could spread misinformation and replace people in the workforce.

He said he had to whisper excuses like “if I hadn’t built it, someone else would have” to avoid being overwhelmed with guilt.

He drew comparisons to the “father of the atomic bomb” Robert Oppenheimer, who was reportedly distraught by his invention and devoted the rest of his life to stopping its proliferation.

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Talking to the New York Times about his dismissal, he warned that in the near future AI would flood the internet with fake photos, videos and texts.

These would be of a standard, he added, where the average person “could not know what is true anymore.”

The technology also posed a serious risk to “drug work,” he said, and could upend the careers of people working as paralegals, personal assistants and translators.

Some employees already say they use it to cover multiple tasks for them, doing tasks like creating marketing materials and transcribing Zoom meetings so they don’t have to listen.

“Maybe what’s going on in these systems is actually a lot better than what’s going on in the [human] brain,” he said, explaining his fears.

“The idea that this stuff can actually get smarter than humans — a few people believed that.

“But most people thought it was far away. And I thought it was far away. I thought it was 30 to 50 years away or even longer.

“Of course I don’t think so anymore.”

Asked why he had helped develop a technology that was potentially dangerous, he said, “I comfort myself with the common excuse: if I hadn’t done it, someone else would have.”

Hinton added that he had previously paraphrased Oppenheimer when asked this question in the past, saying: “If you see something that’s technically beautiful, go ahead and do it.”

Mr Hinton decided to quit Google last month due to the proliferation of AI technologies.

He had a lengthy chat with the CEO of Google parent Alphabet, Sundar Pichai, before leaving — though it’s not clear what was said.

In an open letter to his former employer, he accused Google of not being a “proper steward” for AI technologies.

In the past, the company has concealed potentially dangerous technologies, he said. But it had now thrown caution to the wind as it competed with Microsoft – which added a ChatBot to its Bing search engine last month.

Google’s chief scientist, Jeff Dean, said in a statement: “We remain committed to taking a responsible approach to AI. We are constantly learning to understand emerging risks while innovating boldly at the same time.”

Mr. Hinton rose to fame in 2012 when at the University of Toronto, Canada, he and two students designed a neural network that could analyze thousands of photos and taught himself to identify common objects such as flowers, dogs and cars.

Google later spent $44 million to acquire the company Hinton founded based on the technology.

Hinton said Google had acted as a “proper steward” for the technology, careful not to disclose anything that could cause damage.

But after Microsoft expanded its Bing search engine with a chatbot, the search engine giant is now racing to deploy the same kind of technology.

The release of AI bots like ChatGPT (stock image) has sparked calls from many circles to review the technology due to the risk it poses to humanity

ChatGPT was also released last year, but now has more than a billion people signed up to the chatbot, according to the company. It had a whopping 100 million active monthly users in February.

The surge in popularity led more than 1,000 technology leaders to sign an open letter calling for a six-month moratorium — a ban on activity — on the development of new AI systems because of the “risks” they pose.

A few days later, 19 current and former leaders of the Association of the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence issued their own letter warning of the risks.

Dr. Hinton didn’t sign any of those letters at the time, saying he didn’t want to criticize Google until he left, though he shares their concerns.