Nurturing Conditions for Surprises and Breakthroughs in AI

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is on every business leader’s agenda. How do you ensure the AI systems you deploy are harmless and trustworthy? This month, Azeem picks some of his favorite conversations with leading AI safety experts to help you break through the noise.

Today’s pick is Azeem’s 2021 conversation with veteran AI scientist Murray Shanahan, professor of cognitive robotics at Imperial College London and principal scientist at DeepMind.

They discuss:

• Why some aspects of AI progress depend on embodied interaction.
• Understanding from where the major breakthroughs in the field may come.
• Why the salary inflation for commercial AI engineers might hinder research.

Further resources:

• Role Play with Large Language Models (Murray Shanahan et al., 2023)
• Demis Hassabis on DeepMind’s Journey from Games to Fundamental Science (Exponential View, 2019)