The development of AI technology has caused concern and worry among many people, including Warren Buffett, the famous investor and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway. At the company’s annual conference in Omaha, Nebraska, Buffett compared the powerful AI technology to an atomic bomb, arguing that it could have catastrophic consequences for humanity.
Warren Buffett revealed that Microsoft founder Bill Gates had shown him the AI chatbot ChatGPT when he experienced it. He was impressed with the app’s capabilities, but also felt a tinge of fear. “When something can do all sorts of things, I get a little worried. Because I know we can’t invent it, just like we invented the atomic bomb in World War II for very legitimate reasons,” says the 92-year-old investor, “and it’s very important that we do that. But is it good for the world for the next two hundred years that the ability to do so is unleashed?”
Buffett further said he believes AI technology will change “everything in the world except the way humans think and behave,” citing a quote from Albert Einstein after the introduction of the atomic bomb: “It changed everything in the world except the human mind. “
With Warren Buffett also attending the meeting with Berkshire Hathaway vice chairman Charlie Munger, Munger held a more skeptical attitude toward AI technology, “I personally am skeptical of AI hype, I think conventional wisdom works just fine,” he said.
Not only Buffett and Munger, but many tech entrepreneurs have also expressed wariness of AI technology, including Tesla CEO Elon Musk. More recently, Jeffrey Hinton, known as one of the “godfathers of AI,” expressed similar concerns, saying AI could pose a more “urgent” threat to humanity than climate change.
