• by Laurie Sullivan , over 1 hour ago

Bill Gates, who co-founded Microsoft in 1975 with his childhood friend Paul Allen, issued a warning this week that artificial intelligence (AI) will lead to widespread unemployment and societal decline if world governments and AI labs do not take immediate action to prepare for the impact of the technology.

“AI will either be the greatest equalizer ever invented, or the worst source of injustice,” Gates wrote in a blog post published late Tuesday. “The challenge is monumental. Even under the best circumstances, the transition to this new AI era will be one of the most turbulent times in human history.”

In the several thousand-word essay, Gates argues that world leaders and technology experts worldwide must quickly respond to and act on questions such as how people will use AI technology to make the world a more fair place to live, keep it from widening the divide between rich and poor, and how to protect the people who are most vulnerable to the harms caused by AI.

He believes that answering these questions and acting on the answers should be a top priority, because it will lead everyone to take the necessary steps for good and leave everyone better off.

Gates warns that the world has not prepared for this change into the AI era. He sees no plan or evidence that leaders, experts and communities are confronting the challenges, mainly because too many people underestimate the extent of the impact AI will have.

“AI models still make mistakes,” he said. “It is hard to envision any of them replacing human cognition when, not long ago, they couldn’t solve a simple Sudoku puzzle or figure out how many R’s are in the word strawberry.”

Reliability is only part of it. Researchers are creating models that can check their own work and improve themselves, and soon they will be substantially better than humans at many tasks, he wrote.

He also called out all the positive things AI can do, along with all the negative factors. He wrote that this all calls for change, and called upon lawmakers around the world to create a domestic and international framework for dealing with AI.

“After the attacks of 9/11, the U.S. government went through its biggest reorganization since World War II for the purpose of improving just one function, national security,” Gates wrote. He added that AI will require much more. “It will affect national security as well as employment, education, taxation, energy, elections, air and water, public health, the financial system, law enforcement, transportation, public lands, and IT systems.”

Gates called on government leaders to prepare for the change by passing legislation that would tax tokens, a measurement of how much text AI models are processing, to offset lost income taxes and fund a broader social safety net for workers displaced by AI.

He also said governments and private companies should consider protecting some jobs from automation, especially in fields where retraining workers would become difficult.

To offset lost income taxes and fund a broader social safety network for workers displaced by AI, he called on government leaders to prepare by passing legislation that would tax tokens, a measurement of how much text AI models are processed.

“As workers are pushed into different jobs, they will need retraining and other support from the social safety net,” Gates wrote. “But they will be working less, which means they will be paying less in income taxes, and government revenues will drop just when the demand for those services is greatest. The funds will have to come from somewhere at a time when budgets are stretched.”