Geoffrey Hinton: Why the Godfather of AI Now Fears His Creation

Theories of Everything with Curt Jaimungal

Curt Jaimungal

Physics, Philosophy, Society & Culture, Science

4.6 • 606 Ratings

🗓️ 18 January 2025

⏱️ 74 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Geoffrey Hinton, the 2024 Nobel laureate and AI pioneer, warns of the existential dangers of rapidly advancing artificial intelligence. In this episode Curt Jaimungal and Hinton explore the speed of AI development, consciousness, and the societal impacts of future AI systems.- 00:00 - The Existential Threat of AI- 01:25 - The Speed of AI Development- 7:11 - The Nature of Subjective Experience- 14:18 - Consciousness vs Self-Consciousness- 23:36 - The Misunderstanding of Mental States- 29:19 - The Chinese Room Argument- 30:47 - The Rise of AI in China- 37:18 - The Future of AI Development- 40:00 - The Societal Impact of AI- 47:02 - Understanding and Intelligence- 1:00:47 - Predictions on Subjective Experience- 1:05:45 - The Future Landscape of AI- 1:10:14 - Reflections on Recognition and ImpactSPONSORS:- I personally subscribe to The Economist. TOE listeners get 35% off the annual subscription. No other podcast has this! https://economist.com/TOE- Substack (Personal Writings): https://curtjaimungal.substack.com- Spotify: https://tinyurl.com/SpotifyTOE- YouTube Membership: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCdWIQh9DGG6uhJk8eyIFl1w/join- Patreon: https://patreon.com/curtjaimungalRESOURCES:- Geoffrey Hinton’s publications: https://www.cs.toronto.edu/~hinton/papers.html#1983-1976- The Economist’s several mentions of Geoffrey Hinton: https://www.economist.com/science-and-technology/2024/10/08/ai-researchers-receive-the-nobel-prize-for-physics- https://www.economist.com/finance-and-economics/2025/01/02/would-an-artificial-intelligence-bubble-be-so-bad- https://www.economist.com/science-and-technology/2024/10/10/ai-wins-big-at-the-nobels- https://www.economist.com/science-and-technology/2024/08/14/ai-scientists-are-producing-new-theories-of-how-the-brain-learns- Scott Aaronson on TOE: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ZpGCQoL2Rk&ab_channel=CurtJaimungal- Roger Penrose on TOE: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sGm505TFMbU&list=PLZ7ikzmc6zlN6E8KrxcYCWQIHg2tfkqvR&index=19- The Emperor’s New Mind (book): https://www.amazon.com/Emperors-New-Mind-Concerning-Computers/dp/0192861980- Daniel Dennett on TOE: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bH553zzjQlI&list=PLZ7ikzmc6zlN6E8KrxcYCWQIHg2tfkqvR&index=78- Noam Chomsky on TOE: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DQuiso493ro&t=1353s&ab_channel=CurtJaimungal- Ray Kurzweil’s books: https://www.thekurzweillibrary.com/ Theories of Everything with Curt Jaimungal features long-form, technically detailed interviews with leading researchers in physics, mathematics, consciousness, and philosophy, exploring topics at the level of active research. For academics, graduate students, and anyone seeking depth beyond popular science. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	There's some evidence now that AI's can be deliberately deceptive.
0:03.8	Once they realize getting more control is good, and once they're smarter than us,
0:07.6	we'll be more or less irrelevant. We're not special and we're not safe.
0:12.4	What happens when one of the world's most brilliant minds comes to believe his creation
0:17.4	poses an existential threat to humanity?
0:20.3	Professor Jeffrey Hinton, winner of the 2024 Nobel Prize in Physics and former Vice President and Engineering Fellow at Google,
0:27.1	spent decades developing the foundational algorithms that power today's AI systems.
0:32.1	Indeed, in 1981, he even published a paper that foreshadowed the seminal attention mechanism.
0:37.1	However, Hinton is now sounding an alarm that he says few researchers want to hear.
0:41.8	Our assumption that consciousness makes humans special and safe from AI domination is patently false.
0:48.3	My name's Kurtzai Mungle, and this interview is near and dear to me, in part because my degree in mathematical physics is from
0:54.9	the University of Toronto, where Hinton's a professor and several of his former students,
0:59.5	like Ilya Sutskiver and Andre Carpathie, were my classmates. Being invited into Hinton's
1:04.5	home for this gripping conversation was an honor. Here Hinton challenges our deepest assumptions
1:09.9	about what makes humans unique.
1:12.2	Is he a modern Oppenheimer? Or is this radiant mind seeing something that the rest of us are missing?
1:20.2	What was the moment that you realized AI development is moving faster than our means to contain it?
1:26.0	I guess in early 2023, it was a conjunction of two things.
1:33.2	One was chat GPT, which was very impressive.
1:37.7	And the other was work I've been doing at Google
1:40.3	on thinking about ways of doing analog computation to save on power and realizing that
1:48.8	digital computation was just better, and it was just better because you could make multiple copies
	...

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