ChatGPT AI is about to be eclipsed by ‘interactive AI’, DeepMind founder says

Mustafa Suleyman says ‘huge shift’ will be ‘very, very profound moment in the history of technology’

Anthony Cuthbertson
Monday 18 September 2023 12:29 BST
Comments
A robot at the Robotics Innovation Center of the German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence (DFKI) in Bremen, Germany, on 14 September, 2023
A robot at the Robotics Innovation Center of the German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence (DFKI) in Bremen, Germany, on 14 September, 2023 (Getty Images)

Your support helps us to tell the story

From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.

At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.

The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.

Your support makes all the difference.

The current wave of generative AI tools like ChatGPT will soon be surpassed by “interactive artificial intelligence”, according to AI pioneer Mustafa Suleyman.

The co-founder of DeepMind, which was acquired by Google for $500 million in 2014, said the next generation of AI tools will be “a step change in the history of our species”, allowing people to not just obtain information but also order tasks and services to be carried out on their behalf.

“The first wave of AI was about classification. Deep learning showed that we can train a computer to classify various types of input data: images, video, audio, language. Now we’re in the generative wave, where you take that input data and produce new data,” Mr Suleyman told MIT Technology Review.

“The third wave will be the interactive phase. That’s why I’ve bet for a long time that conversation is the future interface. You know, instead of just clicking on buttons and typing, you’re going to talk to your AI.”

This will allow users to ask these AI to perform tasks for them, which they will carry out by talking with other people and interacting with other AIs.

“That’s a huge shift in what technology can do. It’s a very, very profound moment in the history of technology that I think many people underestimate,” he said.

“Technology today is static. It does, roughly speaking, what you tell it to do. But now technology is going to be animated. It’s going to have the potential freedom, if you give it, to take actions. It’s truly a step change in the history of our species that we’re creating tools that have this kind of, you know, agency.”

When questioned about the potential risks of giving artificial intelligence autonomy, Mr Suleyman said it was important to set boundaries for the technology and make sure that it is aligned with human interests.

When Mr Suleyman was still working at DeepMind, his colleagues helped develop what became known as a “big red button” that would effectively serve as an off switch for rogue AI.

A research paper titled ‘Safely Interruptible Agents’ described how any misbehaving robot could be shut down or overriden by a human operator in order to avoid “irreversible consequences”.

Join our commenting forum

Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies

Comments

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged inPlease refresh your browser to be logged in