Tesla CEO ElonMusk Elon Musk made a brief appearance via video at the just concluded Bosch Connected World Conference, talking aboutGenerative AI, super-intelligent AGI, self-driving cars, and robots, among other topics.
Musk has expressed his concerns about artificial intelligence, emphasizing that without regulation and safeguards, the technology could get out of control and have negative consequences. He is currently suing OpenAI and its CEO Sam Altman for abandoning the startup's original vision (to provide AI to everyone for free) in favor of pursuing profit.
At the beginning of the interview, Musk talked about self-driving cars, a technology that relies heavily on artificial intelligence. The billionaire said,Tesla is close to achieving full self-driving in the United States, with plans to expand to Europe and other regions.
Musk also pointed out that generative AI is advancing rapidly in computing, with applications such as chatbots that allow users to generate content and images in an instant. He added that the rate of adoption and development of the technology is increasing tenfold every six months. "I've never seen any technology move faster than this," Musk said.
He attributed Nvidia's tremendous success and revenue growth to the increased demand for AI chips, which has made Nvidia the world's most profitable semiconductor chip brand.
Musk said: "The amount of AI computing power put into use seems to increase 10 times every six months. Obviously it can't continue at this high rate forever, otherwise it will exceed the mass of the universe, but I have never seen anything like it. The chip boom is bigger than any gold rush."
Musk also talked about the growth of global robotics technology brought about by the emergence of generative AI and its advancement. Unlike industrial robots that are explicitly programmed to perform specific tasks, humanoid robots have more complex capabilities. He also revealed that Tesla's Optimus Prime project is developing humanoid robots that can handle complex tasks like humans.
Musk said,I think we are really on the brink of the biggest technological revolution that could happen in history.You know, there’s supposedly a Chinese curse: ‘May you live in interesting times.’ Well, we live in the most interesting times. Honestly, there was a time when that was a little depressing for me. I thought, are they going to take over? Are we going to be obsolete? ” Musk joked that he hopes the robots will be friendly to us.
With technology growing exponentially, Musk said we are living in the most interesting times. This brings to mind the possibility that artificial intelligence and humanoid robots may take over the human race, rendering humans useless.
Musk went on to say that he had originally predicted GPU He also added that it is almost impossible to expect technology to grow rapidly to the point where it exceeds the mass of the universe without encountering any challenges. Now, the CEO predicts that power and transformer shortages will become a bottleneck for these technological breakthroughs to operate.
His concerns are not unfounded. A study last year showed that by 2027, chatbots like Microsoft Copilot and ChatGPT could consume enough electricity per year to support a small country. Musk said,Such power shortages could occur as early as 2025.
That’s not even counting the high cost of running a chatbot, which can run up to $700,000 per day, and the huge demand for cooling water (generative AI consumes one bottle of water per query for cooling).