Editor BGF

First, Washington needs to start taking AGI seriously. The potential risks are too great to ignore. Even in a good scenario, AGI could upend economies and displace millions of jobs, requiring society to adapt. In a bad scenario, AGI could become uncontrollable.

Second, we must establish regulatory guardrails for powerful AI systems. Regulation should involve government transparency into what’s going on with the most powerful AI systems that are being created by tech companies. Government transparency will reduce the chances that society is caught flat-footed by a tech company developing AGI before anyone else is expecting. And mandated security measures are needed to prevent U.S. adversaries and other bad actors from stealing AGI systems from U.S. companies. These light-touch measures would be sensible even if AGI weren’t a possibility, but the prospect of AGI heightens their importance.

In a particularly concerning part of Saunders’ testimony, he said that during his time at OpenAI there were long stretches where he or hundreds of other employees would be able to “bypass access controls and steal the company’s most advanced AI systems, including GPT-4.” This lax attitude toward security is bad enough for U.S. competitiveness today, but it is an absolutely unacceptable way to treat systems on the path to AGI. The comments were another powerful reminder that tech companies cannot be trusted to self-regulate.

Finally, public engagement is essential. AGI isn’t just a technical issue; it’s a societal one. The public must be informed and involved in discussions about how AGI could impact all of our lives.

BGF has been pioneering the AI World Society (AIWS) since 2017.

Daniel Colson

https://time.com/7093792/ai-artificial-general-intelligence-risks/

A recent article published on Fox News highlights concerns from experts regarding the United Nations’ involvement in artificial intelligence (AI) regulation. The expert warns that the UN’s approach could potentially lead to overregulation, stifling innovation and hindering the development of AI technologies.

The core of the concern revolves around the balance between ensuring safety and promoting innovation. Overly stringent regulations may impede technological advancements and limit the benefits that AI can bring to society. On the other hand, insufficient regulation could lead to unethical uses of AI or unintended consequences.

The Boston Global Forum (BGF) has been a pioneer in AI governance since 2017 through its AI World Society (AIWS) Initiative. The AIWS initiative advocates for a balanced approach to AI governance that promotes innovation while ensuring ethical standards and societal benefits.

The concerns raised about the UN’s role in AI regulation underscore the need for ongoing discussions about the future of AI governance. Balancing innovation with safety is a complex challenge that requires input from various stakeholders.

The US will hold a safety summit in November to better coordinate global regulation efforts.

We invite you to share your thoughts and insights on this critical issue. Please send your perspectives to [email protected].

Your contributions will help shape meaningful discussions and inform strategies that aim to harness the potential of AI for the betterment of society.

For more information on BGF’s efforts in AI governance and to explore the AI World Society Initiative, please visit our publication: AIWS: Pioneering AI Governance and New Democracy.

An AI script editor could help decide what films get made in Hollywood. Callaia provides analysis and feedback on scripts in seconds. But, as AI models are trained to be, it might be too nice to be truly useful.

On September 24, 2024, it launched a new tool called Callaia, which amateur writers and professional script readers alike can use to analyze scripts at $79 each. Using AI, it takes Callaia less than a minute to write its own coverage, which includes a synopsis, a list of comparable films, grades for areas like dialogue and originality, and actor recommendations. It also makes a recommendation on whether or not the film should be financed, giving it a rating of “pass,” “consider,” “recommend,” or “strongly recommend.” Though the foundation of the tool is built with ChatGPT’s API, the team had to coach the model on script-specific tasks like evaluating genres and writing a movie’s logline, which summarize the story in a sentence.

“It helps people understand the script very quickly,” says Tobias Queisser, Cinelytic’s cofounder and CEO, who also had a career as a film producer. “You can look at more stories and more scripts, and not eliminate them based on factors that are detrimental to the business of finding great content.”

The idea is that Callaia will give studios a more analytical way to predict how a script may perform on the screen before spending on marketing or production. But, the company says, it’s also meant to ease the bottleneck that script readers create in the filmmaking process. With such a deluge to sort through, many scripts can make it to decision-makers only if they have a recognizable name attached. An AI-driven tool would democratize the script selection process and allow better scripts and writers to be discovered, Queisser says.

https://www.technologyreview.com/2024/09/24/1104356/an-ai-script-editor-could-help-decide-what-films-get-made-in-hollywood/

A groundbreaking art installation at UN Headquarters by renowned media artist Refik Anadol leverages artificial intelligence to raise awareness of the beauty and fragility of the world’s coral reefs, and the urgent need to address the climate crisis.

Abstract shapes in green, orange and white flow into and out of each other in an endless, never-repeating pattern, combined with ambient music that induces a hypnotizing effect on those who stare at it a little too long (like this writer).

It’s pretty hard for delegates at High-Level Week and the Summit of the Future to miss Large Nature Model: Coral. The artwork covers a whole section of wall in the ground floor corridor of the UN Headquarters Conference building, facing the Japanese Peace Garden.

As well as drawing the eye, however, the artist behind the piece is subtly drawing attention to two of the major global issues under discussion at the UN during the busiest week of the year: the climate crisis and the impact of artificial intelligence.

AI was used to gather together millions of photos of coral reefs, many of which are endangered by rising ocean temperatures. The effect on the viewer is both mesmerizing and, given the context, poignant: coral reef ecosystems are among the most vulnerable ecosystems on the planet to climate change.

These undersea cities, which support 25 per cent of marine life, could virtually disappear by the end of this century.

“I hope that Large Nature Model: Coral inspires people to see how technology can foster deeper connections with our planet and empower us to work together toward a more sustainable world,” said Mr. Anadol at the launch of the installation.

He was joined by Vilas Dhar, the President of the Patrick J McGovern Foundation – a philanthropic organization dedicated to advancing artificial intelligence and data science solutions for all – and Melissa Fleming, the UN Under Secretary-General for Global Communications, whose department jointly organized the exhibition.

https://news.un.org/en/story/2024/09/1154636