Elon Musk He has spent his entire career predicting the future.Some of these ideas have been successful – mainly due to his work in space exploration technologies corp.. But for every promise Musk has helped realize through companies like SpaceX, there are many more the billionaire probably wants people to forget.
Musk made some bold predictions about the future of artificial intelligence on Monday. The billionaire tech tycoon seems to sincerely believe that artificial intelligence (AGI) is only a year or two away from the moment when artificial intelligence can apply reason and logic in the same way humans do.
“If you define AGI as being smarter than the smartest human being, I think it could be in the next year. Like in two years,” Musk said in a chat with the head of Norway’s sovereign fund. Tuesday.
“But it’s still a pretty big leap to be smarter than machine-augmented humans collectively,” Musk continued. “So, is it smarter than all humans using computers together to increase output? I think that’s probably another five years away.”
Ironically, Musk’s talk about X Spaces was cut short due to technical issues, something that has happened frequently when Musk has tried to host chats in recent months. To any outside observer, the idea that we’re on the cusp of general artificial intelligence while Musk’s social media platform struggles to host a basic audio chat is intriguing.
Obviously, we’ll just have to wait and see if Musk’s predictions about AGI are correct. But many people think Musk doesn’t understand how far we are from developing what most people think of as general artificial intelligence. Geometric Intelligence CEO Gary Marcus bet Musk $1 million that AI won’t actually be “smarter” than humans by the end of 2025. Another CEO followed suit, Bid $10 million.
As Marcus points out, computers have been “smarter” than humans for decades. Therefore, the parameters Musk is talking about need to be defined in a clearer way. Like the term “artificial intelligence,” the definition of AGI remains fairly vague. But when Musk makes these statements, it makes for cool-sounding headlines.
Today, we take a look at some of the promises and predictions Musk made that have yet to come true. It’s entirely possible that some of these things may become a reality in the future. But enough with the failures, it can be instructive to look back and ask yourself what exactly went wrong, and what was Musk’s motivation for hyping the technology before it was ready.