New York: Geoffrey Hinton, who has been called the ‘godfather of AI’, confirmed on Monday that he left his role at Google last week to speak out about the “dangers” of the technology. which he helped develop.
Hinton’s pioneering work on artificial intelligence systems, shaped like neural networks, powers many of today’s products. He worked part-time at Google for a decade on the tech giant’s AI development efforts, CNN reported, but has since grown to have concerns about the technology and his role in advancing it.
“I console myself with the usual excuse: If I hadn’t done it, someone else would have,” Hinton told The New York Times, which first reported his decision.
Hinton said in a tweet on Monday that he left Google so he could speak openly about the risks of AI, particularly because of his willingness to criticize Google, reports CNN.
“I quit so I could talk about the dangers of AI and how it affects Google,” Hinton said in a tweet, adding that “Google has acted very responsibly.”
Jeff Dean, Google’s chief scientist, said that Hinton had “made a foundational breakthrough in AI” and expressed appreciation for Hinton’s “decade of contributions to Google”.
Hinton’s decision to step back from the company and speak out on the technology comes as a growing number of lawmakers, advocacy groups and tech insiders blame a new crop of AI-powered chatbots for spreading misinformation and displacing jobs. have warned about the potential, CNN reported.
The wave of attention around ChatGPT late last year helped renew an arms race among tech companies to develop and deploy similar AI tools in their products.
OpenAI, Microsoft and Google are at the forefront of the trend, but IBM, Amazon, Baidu and Tencent are working on similar technologies, CNN reported.