AI has accelerated outcomes in fields from medicine to agriculture, as well as making it easier for companies to develop new materials. But its future depends on a number of factors, including the development of advanced artificial intelligence (AI) systems that can generate and process information at a rate much faster than humans can.
In the 1940s and 1950s, pioneering AI researchers gathered at prestigious universities like MIT and Stanford to discuss their work. One of the first examples of such technology was ELIZA, a computer program that could conduct text-based conversations with a human and elicit rudimentary responses.
Another milestone came in 1996, when IBM’s chess-playing computer Deep Blue beat human champion Gary Kasparov in a six-game match. By examining hundreds of million possible moves per second, the machine was able to make far more decisions than its human adversary.
Today, search engines use AI to rank web pages based on relevance and personalisation. Smartphones rely on it to answer questions, recommend services and organise daily routines. And language translation software relies on AI to understand the meaning of words and phrases as they are spoken or written.
But some experts fear that the rapid advancement of AI is ushering in a technopolar world order. Ian Bremmer of Eurasia Group and Mustafa Suleyman of Inflection AI say that companies that control and develop AI are gaining power typically reserved for nation-states, creating a “paradox” that needs to be addressed.