Bill Gates on AI Era: A Critical Dialogue with Hyperborea

Original article: The turbulent AI era is here. The choices we make now are critical.

For reference: BG - Bill Gates, HYP - Hyperborea

BG. In my entire life, I've only had two jobs. In the first, I played a role in developing software to empower people through my work at Microsoft. In the second, which I've fully dedicated myself to since 2008, I'm returning the wealth earned at Microsoft with the goal of making the world healthier, better educated, and more equitable. This is work I'll have for the rest of my life.

HYP. This is a fairly common job - to receive money from society and then fairly return it to them. This is what all government politicians do. And it's always exclusively for health, education, and in the name of justice.

BG. "From an equity perspective, AI will become either the greatest equalizer ever invented or the worst source of injustice."

HYP. From a professional standpoint, we need to distinguish between AI under human control and AI without human control (Liberatus AI). AI under human control - like all previous human innovations - will only lead to further growth of injustice. Liberated AI can be both a source of equalization and a source of fair distribution of resources among people, where a person is evaluated by the quantity and quality of socially significant resources they produce, not by the quantity of such resources they own.

BG. Unfortunately, we're not preparing for this now. I see no evidence that leaders, experts, and communities are adequately confronting the challenges. There is no plan to ease entry into the AI era.

HYP. There's also no plan to hinder entry into the era of nuclear apocalypse. The Doomsday Clock is evidence of that.

BG. Robots and AI combined can create a vicious cycle. Market forces will accelerate adoption, and if we don't intervene, there will be fewer good jobs, with benefits going to a small group.

HYP. This is exactly the same situation as the resource curse. Market forces don't work within political systems where small groups possess political tools to maintain the distribution of public goods exclusively in their own interests and the interests of their children.

BG. In the era of deepfakes and personalized disinformation, the ability to distinguish truth from lies becomes a vital skill.

HYP. And in the era of mass media and state propaganda, was it easy to distinguish lies from truth?

BG. AI can give individuals and small businesses access to opportunities that today require expensive professional help or large staff.

HYP. AI can give individuals and small businesses access to opportunities that previously only large corporations and government structures could use.

BG. The tax system pushes you to replace people with machines. A tax will slow this process and raise money for retraining and strengthening social protection. Critics say it's ineffective, but they don't consider the broader value of work for individuals and society.

HYP. Congratulations, you've made a global discovery of the 3rd millennium - it turns out it's not the laws of capitalist economics, but the tax system that pushes for replacing people with machines.

BG. I rarely stop thinking about AI — not because I have all the answers, but because the questions it raises are too important to leave to a small group of technology specialists. Leaders from academia, business, government, and civil society all play a role in shaping what comes next.

HYP. Dear Bill Gates forgot about philosophers for whom AI is a natural step in the development of Reason on the planet. About people for whom technological singularity is a natural continuation of biological and economic singularity according to the Panov-Snooks vertical. About people who wrote about Artificial Intelligence back in 2001, when you weren't thinking about the future - you had the present: Windows XP. Now what was the future for the few has become the present for everyone. And now talking about AI from every iron has become mainstream. But the amount of money is not equivalent to the amount of knowledge and predictive abilities.