AI will have ‘bigger economic impact’ than Industrial Revolution, expert predicts
Emerging AI technologies will have a bigger impact on the global economy than the Industrial Revolution, a leading expert has predicted.
Emad Mostaque, the founder of Stability AI, the maker of a free AI-image generating tool Stable Diffusion, has suggested artificial intelligence (AI) will be bigger than Google and Facebook within a decade.
Speaking on the BBC’s Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg programme, Mostaque said he agreed with the UK’s former chief scientific advisor Sir Patrick Vallance about the effect of AI.
“By next year this technology is going to be everything,” he said. “It’s moving the nature of society.”
“In ten years time, [AI] will be bigger than Google or Facebook. This is why I think Vallance is right; it’s bigger than the Industrial Revolution,” he said.
He backed growing calls for AI regulations, calling for international standards to be implemented on how AI should be used in society.
Warning on the dangers of AI, he said: “If we have agents that we can’t control and they achieve a level of automation… the worst case scenario is that it proliferates and basically controls humanity.”
“We have to be careful and move fast,” he said. “I think this will have a bigger economic impact than the pandemic and it’s up to us to decide which direction.”
Asked about the risk posed to people’s jobs, he told viewers: “I think it is serious and this is a question that’s occurred with every single technological advancement.
“[But] you can take amazing photos on your Google Pixel or your iPhone but there’s still more photographers employed than ever. What happens is that a lot of tasks become easier. AI lowers the bar so that we can become more productive,” he said.
Citing Goldman Sachs research, he added that integrating AI into more areas of the economy “could add six to seven per cent to GDP” as “everyone can do more, keep their jobs and do their jobs better – it creates abundance”.