The West needs to “work closely” with China about developing and controlling artificial intelligence, a British government minister said on Thursday.
The stance appears to put the UK at odds with America, with Washington stressing that the invitation to Beijing to attend the AI safety summit in Bletchley Park was very much a British decision.
But UK Science Secretary Michelle Donelan told GB News: “What we need to do is work collaboratively with the rest of the world.
“ I compare it to climate change. If we just do our own work in a silo, it won’t have the same impact.”
She added: “It’s not enough just to take a domestic approach, we need to take an international one as well that is why we need to work closely with countries from all over the world including in fact China who we have invited to this summit which speaks volumes for the fact that ‘we get it as a nation’.”
She stressed that there was a “lack of understanding” of the risks from AI but insisted that the Government was “on the front foot” about the fast-developing technology, having recently published an analysis of the dangers, compiled by scientists and security chiefs.
Attending the summit, China’s Vice Minister of Science and Technology Wu Zhaohui, said AI technology is “uncertain, unexplainable and lacks transparency.”
“It brings risks and challenges in ethics, safety, privacy and fairness. Its complexity is emerging,” he added, noting that Chinese President Xi Jinping last month launched the country’s Global Initiative for AI Governance.
“We call for global collaboration to share knowledge and make AI technologies available to the public under open source terms,” he said.
Britain, the US and other countries have criticised China’s increasingly expansionist foreign policy which includes widespread spying and influencing operations.
Rishi Sunak was on Thursday hosting talks with like-minded countries, which was expected to exclude China, and some companies on the second day of the summit to discuss security risks.
The first international AI Safety Summit, held at the former codebreaking spy base near London, focused on cutting-edge “frontier” AI that some scientists warn could pose a risk to humanity’s very existence.
Mr Sunak said the declaration was “a landmark achievement that sees the world’s greatest AI powers agree on the urgency behind understanding the risks of AI - helping ensure the long-term future of our children and grandchildren.”
But US Vice President Kamala Harris urged Britain and other countries to go further and faster, stressing the transformations AI is already bringing and the need to hold tech companies accountable, including through legislation.
In a speech at the US Embassy in London, she said the world needs to start acting now to address “the full spectrum” of AI risks, including bias in systems, not just existential threats such as massive cyberattacks or AI-formulated bioweapons.
“There are additional threats that also demand our action, threats that are currently causing harm and to many people also feel existential,” she said, citing a senior citizen kicked off his health care plan because of a faulty AI algorithm or a woman threatened by an abusive partner with deep fake photos.
She pointed to President Joe Biden’s executive order this week, setting out AI safeguards, as evidence the US is leading by example in developing rules for artificial intelligence that work in the public interest.
Ms Harris also encouraged other countries to sign up to a US-backed pledge to stick to “responsible and ethical” use of AI for military aims.
“President Biden and I believe that all leaders - have a moral, ethical and social duty to make sure that AI is adopted and advanced in a way that protects the public from potential harm and ensures that everyone is able to enjoy its benefits,” she said.
Getting 28 nations, including the US and China, to sign the agreement published on Wednesday, dubbed the Bletchley Declaration, was an achievement, even if it is light on details and does not propose a way to regulate the development of AI.
The countries pledged to work toward “shared agreement and responsibility” about AI risks, and hold a series of further meetings. South Korea will hold a mini virtual AI summit in six months, followed by an in-person one in France a year from now.
Tesla boss Elon Musk is also scheduled to discuss AI with Mr Sunak in a conversation to be streamed on Thursday night. The tech billionaire was among those who signed a statement earlier this year raising the alarm about the perils that AI poses to humanity.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres and executives from US artificial intelligence companies such as Anthropic, Google’s DeepMind and OpenAI and influential computer scientists like Yoshua Bengio, one of the “godfathers” of AI, are also attending the summit.
