WASHINGTON - A trio of influential artificial intelligence leaders testified at a congressional hearing Tuesday, warning that the frantic pace of AI development could lead to serious harms within the next few years, such as rogue states or terrorists using the tech to create bioweapons.
Yoshua Bengio, an AI professor at the University of Montreal who is known as one of the fathers of modern AI science, said the United States should push for international cooperation to control the development of AI, outlining a regime similar to international rules on nuclear technology. Dario Amodei, the chief executive of AI start-up Anthropic, said he fears cutting edge AI could be used to create dangerous virus and other bioweapons in as little as two years. And Stuart Russell, a computer science professor at the University of California at Berkeley, said the way AI works means it is harder to fully understand and control than other powerful technologies.