The Coming Wave

AI is both valuable and dangerous precisely because it’s an extension of our best and worst selves. […] Ask it to suggest ways of knocking out the freshwater supply, or crashing the stock market, or triggering a nuclear war, or designing the ultimate virus, and it will. Soon.

Despite their ominous reflections, I like to read what artificial intelligence (AI) experts have to say on the future of technology (and therefore: society). In [b:Superintelligence|20527133|Superintelligence Paths, Dangers, Strategies|Nick Bostrom|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1400884046l/20527133.SY75.jpg|37286000] (2014) Nick Bostrom put the focus on the creation of superintelligence and the possibility of a singularity. Ironically, this is what Mustafa Suleyman warns against. The co-founder of DeepMind prefers to look at gradual changes and nearer-term milestones rather than trying to read crystal balls. He also takes a broader perspective on technology by defining the ‘coming wave’ as an ‘emerging cluster of related technologies centered on AI and synthetic biology whose transformative applications will both empower humankind and present unprecedented risks’.Both writers emphasise the importance of containing technology and acknowledge the difficulty to do so. Suleyman explains how proliferation has become default; as technologies get cheaper and spread faster, so do the risks. Nowadays, anyone can get their hands on AI weapons or create disinformation or deepfakes. The coming wave sets the political agenda and threatens nation states and the geopolitical order as we know it. Among the perils are cyberattacks, automated wars, engineered pandemics and, more generally, a world subject to inexplicable and yet seemingly omnipotent forces.At the same time, Suleyman reminds us that we cannot do without the coming wave: stagnation is a danger in itself. As an example, he mentions the expected declining world population, even in countries like China, Mexico and Turkey. Without the new technologies, it will be virtually impossible to maintain the status quo. This poses a dilemma, although Suleyman is also quick to admit that the coming wave is inevitable. In theory, contained technology should be the way out, provided the approach is global. (Suleyman compares this debate to climate change.) In his final chapter, he presents ten steps to aspire this goal. I was particularly interested in his advocacy for public engagement (something I picked up from [b:Mission Economy|55742686|Mission Economy A Moonshot Guide to Changing Capitalism|Mariana Mazzucato|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1603166951l/55742686.SY75.jpg|73121548]) and for international treaties.In the end, I appreciated Suleyman’s work better than Bostrom’s as he describes the risks more accurately and provides good examples (notably on large language models). One must bear in mind though that his book was published almost a decade later, which is an eternity in terms of the coming wave. Moreover, as a layman, I am not best qualified to assess the presented arguments. They do however prompt thought.The next book on my list is [b:Your Face Belongs to Us|75591715|Your Face Belongs to Us|Kashmir Hill|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1686179432l/75591715.SY75.jpg|100481458] by Kashmir Hill. If you are interested, I can also recommend Cathy O’Neill’s [b:Weapons of Math Destruction|28186015|Weapons of Math Destruction How Big Data Increases Inequality and Threatens Democracy|Cathy O'Neil|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1456091964l/28186015.SX50.jpg|48207762].