In a long 7-page letter, Bill Gates announces the advent of the AI era and predicts the future of this technology. According to him, the machine will equal the human brain within 10 to 100 years…
Long regarded as the world’s richest man, computer pioneer, visionary investor and man close to power : Bill Gates is not just anybody. And when he speaks, it’s a good idea to listen carefully to see what’s in store…
A few years before the Covid-19 crisis, in 2015the Microsoft founder had already predicted the imminence of a devastating pandemic.
Now, the famous American has published a 7-page letter entitled ” The Age of AI has Begun The Age of AI has Begun”.
This document appears one week after the launch of GPT-4 by OpenAI, and on the same day as the launch of Google Bard. If you don’t know, it’s also the day of the vernal equinox, marked by a new moon in Aries, which means the beginning of a brand-new cycle…
In this lengthy manifesto, Bill Gates shares his vision of the future of artificial intelligence. According to him, this technology is ” as fundamental as the creation of the microprocessor, the PC, the Internet and the cell phone. “.
In the past, the businessman has already expressed his enthusiasm about the future of AI. In particular, he believes it could be used in education, or to provide medical advice for people without access to medicine.
If he reiterates this optimism in his letter, the billionaire also shares his concerns. According to him, there is a significant risk that humans will misuse it.
What’s more, as technology improves, it’s possible that a extremely powerful AI will emerge and ” sets its own goals “…
In this letter, Gates highlights the double-edged sword of artificial intelligence a tool that can increase productivity, but also risks widening global inequalities…
A personal digital assistant for everyone
In the world of work, Bill Gates explains how AI could be used as ” personal digital assistant “ to increase employee productivity.
Integrated with digital tools such as the Microsoft Office suite, it could, for example, help manage and draft emails. The ” personal agents “AI-generated could also share their knowledge and data with the teams.
Thus, as the cost of computing power decreasesHe believes that GPT will become more and more like a worker available to help us with different tasks.
A valuable help in the healthcare sector
Also according to Bill Gates, for the healthcare industry, AI could free professionals from administrative tasks administrative tasks.
In poorer countries, carers could become more productive and thus take on more patients. It is even possible that AI could help treat patients living away from healthcare facilities.
As the billionaire points out, artificial intelligence is already being used to analyze medical data and design new drugs. However, the next generation of tools will even be capable of helping to predict drug side effects and calculate dosages.
Another possibility would be to let AI design seeds adapted to local climates for agriculture in poor countries, and of develop vaccines for livestock.
This could become crucial in the face of climate change and extreme temperatures putting massive pressure on farmers in the poorest regions.
A revolution in education
As far as education is concerned, Bill Gates predicts a real transformation in the next five to ten years. AI will provide personalized content for each student’s learning style, and will be able to learn what motivates each individual or, on the contrary, causes them to lose interest in the curriculum.
Similarly, AI could help teachers plan their lessons and assess students’ understanding of the various topics covered in class.
However, even when the technology is perfect, Gates believes that ” learning will always depend on a good relationship between students and teachers “. Consequently, AI will not replace teachers.
Furthermore, he stresses that AI will have to be equitably accessible to all schools worldwide, so that children from disadvantaged homes are not left behind.
In addition, teachers will have to adapt to students’ use of new technologies such as ChatGPT. As an example, he suggests letting a student use GPT to write a first draft of an essay before personalizing and fleshing it out.
AI equal to the human brain in 10 years?
According to Bill Gates, ” superintelligent AIs are our future “. He predicts the emergence of artificial intelligence equal to the human brain. within 10 to 100 years at most.
As the American explains, ” compared to a computer, our brains work at a snail’s pace: an electrical signal in the brain travels 100,000 times slower than in a silicon chip “.
Thus, when developers are able to generalize a learning algorithm and run it at computer speed, we will be faced with AGI (general artificial intelligence) incredibly powerful.
This AI will be “ capable of doing everything a human brain can dowith no limits on memory size or speed. This will be a profound change “.
Unfortunately, ” there is a possibility that AIs could get out of control “. Indeed, “ a machine could decide that humans are a threatthat its interests are different from ours, or simply stop caring about us. “.
Generally speaking, to exploit the full potential of this new technology, Bill Gates calls for both set up barriers against the risks and spread the benefits to as many people as possible…