good morning. Clay Chandler writes from Hong Kong.
Senior U.S. and Chinese officials met in Geneva on Tuesday to discuss for the first time how the two countries can work together to ensure emerging artificial intelligence technologies do not become an existential risk.
Ahead of the talks, officials from both countries expressed concerns that the other would use AI to spread disinformation, establish military superiority and rely on algorithms rather than humans to make important national security decisions. He said there was.
Taiwanese AI pioneer Lee Kai-fu was one of the first to warn that AI and data could change the world's balance of power. In his 2018 book, AI superpower“Many have compared today's 'AI race' to the space race of the 1960s, or worse, the arms race of the Cold War era, which produced the most powerful weapons of mass destruction ever produced,” Lee said. ” he said with concern.
at that time, Conventional wisdom is China has an advantage in the AI arms race. With a larger population (and therefore more data) than the United States, the sector received significant support from the government.
But since November 2022, when OpenAI released ChatGPT, the US has clearly been at the forefront of AI. The large language model chatbot currently has more than 180 million users and is locked in competition with domestic rivals such as Google's Gemini, Meta's Llama and Anthropic's Claude 3.
China's closest equivalent to ChatGPT is Ernie Bot, a large language chatbot launched by search giant Baidu last August. According to Baidu, Ernie has over 200 million users and is faster than ChatGPT4. Chinese technology giants such as Alibaba, SenseTime and Tencent are also rolling out chatbots, but their reviews are generally mixed.
According to ITjuzi, there are about 260 generative AI startups in China.of financial times We recently profiled four companies (valued between $1.2 billion and $2.5 billion): Zhipu AI, Moonshot AI, Minimax, and 01.ai (founded by Lee). However, Chinese generative AI startups have lagged behind their U.S. peers in technology development and funding.
One key difference in how the U.S. and China pursue the AI arms race is that Chinese companies will not only have to operate within a strict regulatory framework aimed at reinforcing state legitimacy, but will also need to protect their privacy. This means other objectives such as protecting customers, protecting against deepfakes, and preventing shipping companies must also be achieved. Stop using algorithms to overwork your employees.
This is very different from the US. On Wednesday, a bipartisan group of U.S. senators led by Chuck Schumer opposed the AI Safety Act, citing concerns about “stifling innovation.” Instead, the committee called for an increase in federal spending on AI by $32 billion per year. Schumer described the increase as a “surge in emergency funding to solidify America's dominance in AI,” including “beating China.”
For now, at least, the Americans seem determined to maintain their lead in the global AI arms race, even at the risk of other homegrown dangers.
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clay chandler
clay.chandler@fortune.com
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