Pause AI development for what?
That's what Meta Platform's (META) top executives, including CEO Mark Zuckerberg, might have thought when they read the open letter asking that software developers slow down development of artificial intelligence, based on a new interview with Nikkei Asia.
That letter was signed by Tesla CEO Elon Musk and Apple Co-Founder Steve Wozniak.
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But Meta executives, including chief product officer Chris Cox and technology officer Andrew Bosworth, are spending most of their time working on AI.
"We just created a new team, the generative AI team, a couple of months ago; they are very busy. It's probably the area that I'm spending the most time [in], as well as Mark Zuckerberg and Chris Cox," Bosworth told Nikkei Asia.
"We feel very confident that ... we are at the very forefront. Quite a few of the techniques that are in large language model development were pioneered [by] our teams."
Meta established its research lab in 2013 and the company's lab was the second-most cited in major studies published on AI in 2022, Nikkei Asia reported, behind only Google (GOOGL).
As for pausing AI development: don't expect the company to participate in any type of slowdown.
"I think it's very important to invest in responsible development, and we do that kind of investment all the time. However, it's very hard to stop progress and make the right decisions on what changes you would make. Very often you have to understand how technology evolves before you can know how to protect and make it safe. And so I think, not only is it unrealistic, I don't think it would be effective," Bosworth said.
