Last year, the world’s first global AI Safety Summit took place at Britain’s Bletchley Park, gathering world leaders, business executives, and academic specialists. The aim was to reach an agreement on regulating a technology that some had warned posed a threat to humanity.
Despite growing tensions with the US, the CEO of OpenAI, Sam Altman, and Tesla’s Elon Musk mingled with some of their most ardent detractors. Additionally, China signed the “Bletchley Declaration” with the US and other countries, indicating its willingness to collaborate with the US.
Six months later, excitement about artificial intelligence’s potential gives way to concerns about its limitations. Britain and South Korea will co-host the second AI Safety Summit, which will be mostly virtual.
Senior analyst Martha Bennett of research and consultancy firm Forrester stated, “There are some radically different approaches…it will be difficult to move beyond what was agreed at Bletchley Park,” alluding to the historic but inescapably broad agreement on AI safety.
More serious concerns like data scarcity, environmental damage, and copyright usage are unlikely to draw a crowd as impressive as this one.
Even if the event’s organizers have teased something akin to Bletchley, several of its prominent participants have declined invitations to Seoul.
HYPE
At the end of the first summit in November, British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak announced follow-up meetings, enabling nations to monitor the quickly advancing technology every six months.
Since then, the focus has shifted from existential concern to addressing the resources required to advance AI. This includes managing the enormous volume of data needed to train big language models and supplying the electricity needed to power an increasing number of data centers.
“The policy discourse around AI has expanded to include other important concerns, such as market concentration and environmental impacts,” said Francine Bennett, interim director of the data and AI-focused Ada Lovelace Institute.
The CEO of OpenAI, Altman, has stated that a breakthrough in energy will determine the direction of AI. In February, The Wall Street Journal revealed that he was also trying to raise up to $7 trillion to increase the manufacturing of computer chips. Currently, these chips are in low supply.
However, experts caution against staking the future of AI solely on profitable funding initiatives and scientific advances. They suggest considering alternative approaches for a more prudent course of action.
“The failure of the technology to live up to the hype is inevitable,” said Professor Jack Stilgoe, an expert in technology policy at University College London.
“People will find surprising and creative uses for this technology, but that doesn’t mean the future is going to look how Elon Musk or Sam Altman imagine it.”
Last week, when Meta announced it would double down on AI, its shares fell 13%. However, the markets welcomed the payoff from large investments by Google and Microsoft.
NO-SHOWS
The May 21–22 summit in South Korea was always referred to as a “mini summit” in advance of the subsequent in-person meeting in Paris.
The purpose of the first day’s virtual “leaders session” and the second day’s in-person meeting of technology ministers was to specifically build on the legacy of Bletchley Park.
Despite the French government’s decision to postpone the next meeting until 2025, individuals familiar with the situation indicate that significantly fewer presidents and ministers are expected to attend.
While confirming that Margrethe Vestager, Thierry Breton, and Vera Jourova, the EU’s top tech regulators, would not be there, an EU spokesman did not rule out the bloc’s attendance.
The US Department of State confirmed sending delegates to Seoul, although it did not specify which ones. The governments of the Netherlands and Canada declared their non-participation.
Brazil’s government stated that it was still debating whether to accept the offer. However, it noted a conflict with the G20 meeting that takes place there that same week.
The head of digitalization at the department of foreign affairs, Ambassador Benedikt Weschsler, is expected to attend in person, according to the Swiss government.
“Nothing will ever live up to a first gathering of its kind,” said Linda Griffin, public policy lead at Mozilla, the organisation behind the Firefox web browser.
“Getting international agreements is really hard, so it might take a few iterations of these events to find a rhythm.”
Griffin stated that Mozilla was concentrating on the Paris event and that there was no particular reason why it was not going to the Seoul meeting.
Similar to this, Google DeepMind, a trailblazing AI research team, expressed its appreciation for the event but would not confirm its attendance.
Former Google researcher and AI “godfather” Geoffrey Hinton told Reuters he had turned down an invitation to the event. He cited a medical condition that made flying problematic.
According to a spokesman for the British government, the AI Seoul Summit will build on the momentum of Bletchley Park. It aims to provide additional progress on AI safety, creativity, and inclusion, bringing us all closer to a world where AI is improving our lives in all aspects.
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