Theres no escaping the hype around artificial general intelligence.
In the last month alone, a trio of tech luminaries have added fresh proclamations.
Nvidia CEO Jensen HuangsuggestedAGI would arrive within five years.
Still, not everyone is so bullish.
One notable sceptic is Yann LeCun, Metas chief AI scientist and a winner of the prestigious Turing Award.
The Frenchmanprefersto chart a path towards human-level AI.
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Without these capabilities,AIapplications remain limited and error-prone.
Autonomous vehicles still arent safe for public roads.
Domestic robots struggle with basic household chores.
Our smart assistants can only complete basic tasks.
These intellectual shortcomings are particularly prominent in large language models (LLMs).
In LeCuns view, theyre severely restricted by their reliance on one form of human knowledge: text.
Theyre useful, theres no question about that.
But thats not our primary method of learning.
We consume far more information through our interactions with the world.
LeCun estimates that a typical four-year-old has seen50 times more datathan the worlds biggest LLMs.
Naturally, the 63-year-old has an alternative architecture.
He calls it objective-driven AI.
Objectives of intelligence
Objective-driven AI systems are built to fulfil specific goals set by humans.
The result is a world model that shows the impact of actions.
All the potential changes are then updated in the systems memory.
By learning through experience, the end states begin to become predictable.
As a result, machines can plan the steps needed to complete various tasks.
LeCun is quietly confident about the pay-off.
Eventually, machines will surpass human intelligence… its gonna take a while though, he said.
Its not just around the corner and its certainly not next year like our friend Elon has said.
One of the themes of this years TNW Conference is Ren-AI-ssance: The AI-Powered Rebirth.
Story byThomas Macaulay
Thomas is the managing editor of TNW.
He leads our coverage of European tech and oversees our talented team of writers.
Away from work, he e(show all)Thomas is the managing editor of TNW.
He leads our coverage of European tech and oversees our talented team of writers.
Away from work, he enjoys playing chess (badly) and the guitar (even worse).
