Joseph Gordon-Levitt, who was appointed the United Nations’ first global advocate for human-centric digital governance in March, is arguing that instead of being afraid of AI, “we should be concerned about the people building AI.”
In a new video interview with The New York Times, the actor was asked his current biggest fear about the technology. “I would object to that question just because reducing these concerns into one sound bite of fear — that’s one of the problems,” Gordon-Levitt responded.
“To me, saying: Oh, I’m scared that AI could exterminate all of humanity — that doesn’t really get at the substance of the concern. There’s real validity to that concern. But that’s not the thing that really worries me,” he said, explaining that his worries are “a lot more complicated and a lot more boring to talk about, because it’s a lot more dense,” citing “the decline of democracy, the decline of human empathy” as a concern.
“These companies are betting on the notion that they’re going to take over the entire economy. That would be totalitarianism, and that would be really bad,” Gordon-Levitt added. “Simultaneously, these models are being trained to hijack your intimacy, to make friends with you, to get you to fall in love with it. We shouldn’t be scared of an AI. We should be concerned about the people building AI.”
The Don Jon star previously opened up about his concerns about AI, arguing at a panel hosted by The Hollywood Reporter and Autodesk at Sundance that “we need to build a system for ongoing compensation” as the technology depends on “human input.”
He also joined a group of industry insiders last December to form the Creators Coalition on AI, with its mission being to provide “a central coordinating hub to upgrade our industry’s systems and institutions.” The group additionally has an advisory council that seeks “to establish shared standards, definitions and best practices as well as ethical and artistic protections for if and when AI is used in entertainment projects.”