How far is the booming artificial intelligence from the technological "singularity"?

Author：AronDate：2024-4-11

        From the talking ChatGPT to Vincent video software Sor a, to AIFC (artificial intelligence driven scientific research), the booming artificial intelligence has shown the potential to trigger a new round of technological revolution, and countries around the world are increasing investment. , trying to seize the commanding heights of a new round of technological innovation.

         Every technological revolution in history will bring about great progress in human society. With the recent rapid development of artificial intelligence, the time for the arrival of the technological "singularity" may be greatly shortened. At the Boao Forum for Asia 2024 Annual Conference held not long ago, On the Internet, many experts on artificial intelligence said that the technological "singularity" is likely to arrive in the next three to five years.

         The so-called technological “singularity” refers to the point when the growth of a technology becomes uncontrollable and irreversible, leading to an unforeseen major change in human civilization. Artificial intelligence is expected to become the fuse that detonates the “singularity”. In the future, with the widespread application of AIFC in various industries, artificial intelligence from multi-mode, multi-test, and embedded artificial intelligence is expected to be deeply integrated with machines, thus triggering huge changes in human society.

          Artificial intelligence is not a new term. Artificial intelligence in history has gone through four stages of development. The first is the rule calculation stage, the second is to enter the expert system stage, the third is to enter the deep learning stage similar to AlphaGo, and the fourth is to form a new generation of large model artificial intelligence after the release of OpénAI. leapfrog development stage. The current technology can already intelligently generate videos, music and even codes. It has fully entered the stage of strong artificial intelligence from the weak artificial intelligence stage, which will have a significant impact on technology, products and even industrial ecology.

         Previous technological revolutions have shown that technological progress will suddenly accelerate at a certain stage at a speed that humans have not expected. Artificial intelligence has also gone through a similar process and will eventually become a well-known disruptive change.

         In 2017, there was a survey of artificial intelligence experts. At that time, most artificial intelligence experts predicted that the technological "singularity" would occur between 2045 and 2090, with 2060 being the most likely to occur. Since the beginning of this year, more and more artificial intelligence experts have greatly shortened their judgment on the arrival time of the "singularity". This is mainly due to the rapid development of technology in the past two years, especially the large amount of manpower and material resources that have been brought to artificial intelligence. With the changes coming, we can see a better version of artificial intelligence emerge almost every month or even every week.

         However, although the pace of development is very fast, artificial intelligence based on large model computing power needs to be supported by a large amount of data, a large amount of computing power, and a large amount of energy. It currently faces some bottlenecks, such as large model computing power learning The limited expansion and limited energy supply will limit the application scope of artificial intelligence.

         The current status quo is not unbreakable. The currently accepted view is that artificial intelligence will rush towards quantum computing. In the future, quantum computing, nuclear fusion and artificial intelligence will form a mutually reinforcing relationship and create a synergistic effect, thus breaking the current constraints on artificial intelligence. The practical problems of development have triggered the “singularity” of science and technology.

         The future is here, and mankind needs to prepare for unknown risks. Countries around the world need to work together and strengthen cooperation to smoothly weather the many challenges brought about by the new round of technological revolution.

         In the short term, the commercial application of artificial intelligence is still on the road, and the integration with industry needs to be improved. Judging from the current progress of artificial intelligence, enterprises cannot yet fully rely on artificial intelligence for decision-making. Therefore, do not be too optimistic about artificial intelligence in the short term. We should pay attention to the business model of artificial intelligence in industrial applications, so that when artificial intelligence is combined with industry, it can save costs and improve efficiency for enterprises, rather than just labeling industries as high-tech.

         In the long term, with the rapid development of artificial intelligence, especially the deep integration of artificial intelligence and machines, humans can no longer fully predict its capabilities. Therefore, we cannot be pessimistic in the long term and cannot underestimate the impact and impact of artificial intelligence on human society. At the same time, humans need to continuously improve their awareness of related risks. The accompanying question is how to make artificial intelligence "good". Countries around the world need to strengthen cooperation to govern artificial intelligence.

         Artificial intelligence is only one step away from triggering the technological “singularity”. Currently, the international community has determined the basic principles of artificial intelligence governance, including human-centered artificial intelligence, attention to ecosystems, security, etc. Countries around the world must respect international laws and improve the governance system of artificial intelligence. The key core link is to find ways to turn existing ethical norms into a regulatory framework recognized by countries around the world, and establish a coordinated intergovernmental cooperation mechanism.