Henry Kissinger On A Potential Artificial Intelligence Arms Race

Henry Kissinger and "Sunday Morning" senior contributor Ted Koppel. CBS News 

WNU Editor: The relevant part of his CBS interview on an AI arms race (link here) is below ....  

.... Well beyond an age at which most people are unwilling or unable to learn about the latest technology, Kissinger became obsessed with the subject of artificial intelligence. He collaborated with two co-authors on a 2021 book, "The Age of AI and Our Human Future." 

Koppel asked, "In theory, the United States has declared that it will always maintain and insist upon human control of artificial intelligence. From a practical point of view, it's impossible." 

"Well, it's a highly desirable objective, but the speed with which artificial intelligence acts will make it problematical in crisis situations," Kissinger replied. 

A wartime situation, for example, in which AI recommends a course of action that the President and his advisors consider horrifyingly unwise. "In relying on the answer, we cannot double-check it," said Kissinger, "because we cannot review all the knowledge that the machine has acquired. We are giving it that knowledge. But this will be one of the big debates. I am now trying to do what I did with respect to nuclear weapons, to call attention to the importance of the impact of this evolution." 

"But you know there will also be an artificial intelligence arms race?" 

"Yes, but it's going to be different. Because in the previous arms races, you could develop plausible theories about how you might prevail. It's a totally new problem intellectually."

As to what is my take. 

We have been in an AI arms race for the past decade, and Russian President Putin said it best in 2017 .... Putin says the nation that leads in AI ‘will be the ruler of the world’ (The Verge).