Eric Schmidt: we aren’t going to pause AI progress | The Economist

We are not going to do a pause. because the entire incentive system. in America is not to pause. And furthermore, if you do a pause, you do really open it up. to competitive, either a local competitor. who violates the rules. or the global. So there's not going to be a pause. The right thing to do. is to invent this future. while also. invent the solutions to the problems. that you're creating. It’s just occurring quickly. So, an example here is. there's some evidence. that you can take a new model.

that shows up and. use the previous one, which is typically four months older, to supervise the new model. It looks like that works. And people are trying that. We'll see. if that's technically true at scale. If you look at China, there is no question we are in. an AI race. that is profound. between the Chinese approach, and the American approach. And the easiest way to understand it is, would you prefer to. have your day-to-day life intermediated.

by an American model. or a Chinese model? I think as Westerners. we’d prefer an American. or American and British model. So that to me is the interesting fight. But do you think. there is room. for some limitations, mutually agreed limitations on. AI between China. and the United States? We have the meeting. coming up between. President Xi and President Trump. and A, do you think it's sensible? And B, do you think that the military area,

in modern-day equivalent. of nuclear-arms agreements. would be an area to start? So we all believe that there needs to be. a set of treaties in this area. The first treaty. needs to be one about no surprises. So imagine a situation. where an agent bot. manages to get out of its testing range. by accident, and but ultimately triggers. a nuclear response. because it signals that there's. one coming. and then the nuclear response. happens automatically.

There are plenty of such scenarios. that analysts have come up with. So the single most important thing is a. no surprises rule, right? And the next one. would be to attack the question of cyber. Neither side has been willing to limit. its use of cyberattacks, offensive or defensive capability. If you can't agree to that, it’s going to be hard to agree. to much more. And you don't think. even in principle, a mutual agreement on pausing. would make sense? I think it's... The problem with pausing.

is first place, it's counter to the incentives. of all the players. The second is, how do you verify it?