Microsoft president says no chance of super-intelligent AI soon

Microsoft's President Brad Smith dismisses fear of super-intelligent AI creation within a year.

cde.news desk 3 December 2023, 14:00 · 1 min read

epa06316011 Microsoft's President Brad Smith attends the panel 'How global companies need to earn trust locally to succeed in a cloud services world' on the third day of the 7th Web Summit in Lisbon, Portugal, 08 November 2017. The annual technology and internet conference attracts over 60,000 attendees from more than 100 countries, according to the organizers. EPA-EFE/MARIO CRUZ

By Muvija M and Martin Coulter

LONDON, (Reuters) – The president of tech giant Microsoft said there is no probability of super-intelligent artificial intelligence being created within the next 12 months.

Brad Smith’s comments come one year after Microsoft-backed OpenAI released AI chatbot ChatGPT to the public, sparking a flurry of investment and concern such systems could pose an existential threat to humanity.

Recent reports suggested OpenAI founder Sam Altman may have been ousted from the company following internal wranglings over a potentially dangerous AI discovery. However, Smith rejected these claims.

“I don’t think that is the case at all,” he said, speaking to reporters in Britain on Thursday. “I think there obviously was a divergence between the board and others, but it wasn’t fundamentally about a concern like that.”

Altman was forced out of OpenAI by the company’s board earlier this month, but was swiftly reappointed after a weekend of public outcry from company employees and shareholders.

Smith added: “There’s absolutely no probability that you’re going to see this so-called AGI, where computers are more powerful than people, in the next 12 months.

“It’s going to take years, if not many decades, but I still think the time to focus on safety is now.”