TechBill Gates and OpenAI's Sam Altman discuss the swift and impact-filled future of AI

Bill Gates and OpenAI's Sam Altman discuss the swift and impact-filled future of AI

Bill Gates and OpenAI's Sam Altman discuss the swift and impact-filled future of AI
Images source: © Getty Images | Anadolu

10:21 AM EST, January 18, 2024

Bill Gates had a conversation with Sam Altman, the co-founder of OpenAI (a company responsible, among other things, for Chat GPT), one of the key players in the AI field. They discussed the future of artificial intelligence.

The Microsoft founder confessed that he was initially skeptical about the success of ChatGPT. However, this tool continues to develop; OpenAI recently introduced an updated GPT-4 Turbo model. Gates confessed that his doubts were misplaced this time, but it's worth noting that many of his past technological predictions have proven accurate. He also recently shared his forecasts for 2024.

In their conversation, Sam Altman emphasized the swift pace of development in artificial intelligence. We can expect a better understanding of how the human brain functions in the coming years, which will aid in technology improvement. Current models are on course to be replaced with more advanced and efficient ones.

One of the critical areas of development might be multimodality, enabling more efficient handling of diverse input and output data, including speech, images, and even videos. Altman highlighted a considerable interest from users in adding support for image and sound to ChatGPT. Yet, an even more critical direction might be the ability to reason and the reliability of generating responses.

Both participants expressed a positive attitude towards the impact of artificial intelligence. Presently, this technology contributes to enhancing our productivity. In the future, it could help counter social polarization and find applications in healthcare and education.

Regarding the regulation of artificial intelligence, Altman noted that there might be a need for certain restrictions, since AI impacts society and the geopolitical balance of power. However, he cautioned against the risk of imposing excessive regulations. He suggested mandatory safety checks for the most potent computational clusters as a good precedent, comparing it to the checks imposed by the International Atomic Energy Agency for the safe and peaceful use of nuclear energy.

You can listen to the entire conversation between Bill Gates and Sam Altman below.

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