Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles has said he finds “comfort” in the warnings from AI leaders about the dangers of the technology.
His comments on Sunrise come as widespread fears continue to mount that the uncontrolled growth of artificial intelligence could have major ramifications for mankind.
“Well, firstly, this is an incredible technology and it offers enormous opportunities for humanity as well,” Mr Marles told host Nat Barr.
The deputy Prime Minister said he had met with OpenAI chief executive Sam Altman and Anthropic leader Dario Amodei in San Francisco two weeks ago.
Days ago, Mr Altman joined the tech industry’s calls to put brakes on the unchecked growth of technology, citing his concerns for the safety of humanity for ruling out a possible trillion-dollar IPO for the highly regarded tech outfit.
“I actually think that, given everything happening with safety, right now would be an ill-advised moment to go public, and we don’t feel pressure on that,” he told business magazine Fortune on Saturday.
Asked if there was a 10 per cent chance of AI-driven extinction, Mr Altman said he didn’t know how such an estimate could be made, but warned the risk was serious enough that AI companies and governments should act as though it could not be tolerated.
“Whether it’s 10 or eight or six, the point is, we all have a tremendous amount of responsibility, and cannot let egos or incentives for profit or anything else get in the way,” he said
“We need to act such that we are not taking any of those numbers of risk, and I believe we can.”
On Tuesday morning, Mr Marles said he found “comfort” in the recognition from AI leaders of the technology’s potential.
“Look, to be honest that they are saying we need to move down this path with care gives me a sense of comfort,” he added.
“Like any breakthrough technology, there are huge opportunities, but there are risks and I think they are they are speaking to that.
“But they’re also they’re not stopping in their tracks.”
Mr Marles said that in the essay Mr Amodei penned earlier this week, sounding the alarm about the pace at which artificial intelligence is progressing, “he said it will still feel like we are moving very quickly in terms of the pace of development that they are talking about”.
“From an Australian perspective, this offers a huge opportunity to be a part of this, actually a historic economic opportunity, but also in terms of our national security and our sovereignty,” he added.
“But we need to be doing it in a way which is very much in the interests of our country, which is, for example, protecting copyright, news organisations, creatives, and the like.”
Mr Marles said that the technology was “the future” and it remained important that Australians continued to engage with it.
“It is the future, but doing it on terms which is very much in the Australian interest, so that this is a technology which works for people and not the other way around.”
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