Hinton’s work on neural networks shaped the artificial intelligence systems that power many technology products today.
Hinton, through his part-time job at Google for a decade, helped the tech giant’s efforts to develop artificial intelligence, but since then he’s worried about the technology and its role in its development.
Speaking to The New York Times, Hinton said, “I console myself with the well-known excuse: If I hadn’t done it, someone else would have done it.”
Hinton attributed his decision to leave Google to his desire to speak freely about the dangers of artificial intelligence, not to criticize the company, he said in a tweet on Monday.
Google Chief Scientist Jeff Dean commented on Hinton’s decision, saying, “He has made major breakthroughs in artificial intelligence,” expressing his appreciation for “a decade of contributions to Google.”
“We will remain committed to a responsible approach to artificial intelligence,” Dean said in a statement to CNN. “We are constantly learning to understand emerging risks while boldly innovating.”
Hinton’s decision to want to air his concerns about artificial intelligence came as a growing number of lawmakers and groups issued warnings about the potential for a new batch of chatbots to spread misinformation and destroy jobs.
Hinton is not the first Google employee to be alerted to the dangers of artificial intelligence. Last July, the company fired an engineer who claimed that an undetected intelligence system had become self-aware, while many in this technical field firmly refused to confirm what the engineer said.
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