Chomsky on What ChatGPT Is Good For

Summary

Noam Chomsky Interviewed by C.J. Polychroniou Artificial intelligence (AI) is sweeping the world. It is transforming every walk of life and raising in the process major ethical concerns for society and the future of humanity. ChatGPT, which is dominating social media, is an AI-powered chatbot developed by OpenAI. It is a subset of machine learning and relies on what is called Large Language Models that can generate human-like responses. The potential application for such technology is indeed enormous, which is why there are already calls to regulate AI like ChatGPT. Can AI outsmart humans? Does it pose public threats? Indeed, can AI become an existential threat? The world’s preeminent linguist Noam Chomsky, and one of the most esteemed public intellectuals of all time, whose intellectual stature has been compared to that of Galileo, Newton, and Descartes, tackles these nagging questions in the interview that follows. C. J. Polychroniou: As a scientific discipline, artificial intelligence (AI) dates back to the 1950s, but over the last couple of decades it has been making inroads into all sort of fields, including banking, insurance, auto manufacturing, music, and defense. In fact, the use of AI techniques has been shown in some instance to surpass human capabilities, such as in a game of chess. Are machines likely to become smarter than humans? Noam Chomsky: Just to clarify terminology, the term “machine” here means program, basically a theory written in a notation that can be executed by a computer–and an unusual kind of theory in interesting ways that we can put aside here. We can make a rough distinction between pure engineering and science. There is no sharp boundary, but it’s a useful first approximation. Pure engineering seeks to produce a product that may be of some use. Science seeks understanding. If the topic is human intelligence, or cognitive capacities of other organisms, science seeks understanding of these biological systems. As I understand them, the...