Yoshua Bengio, founder and scientific director of Mila-Quebec AI Institute, speaks at the C2MTL conference on Wednesday on May 24, 2023 in Montreal. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Christinne Muschi
TORONTO – Artificial intelligence pioneer Yoshua Bengio says he will be reorienting his research to ensure he is working on applications of the technology that are not dangerous.
The 2018 winner of the A.M. Turing Award and director of the Mila Quebec AI institute says his research will look at areas such as health care or the environment and aim to prevent bad things that can happen with AI.
Bengio’s remarks came at the conclusion of a Munk debate hosted in Toronto.
He and MIT physics professor Max Tegmark sparred with other technology experts about whether AI poses an existential threat.
As part of his arguments, Bengio said humanity needs to take care of all of the potential downsides of AI and should move toward regulation, because anyone using the technology with malicious intentions could create catastrophe.
Fellow AI pioneer Yann LeCun and Davis Professor of Complexity Melanie Mitchell rebutted that AI can be used for good and does not have the agency to make the kind of decisions that would cause an existential threat.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 22, 2023.
