WASHINGTON, June 3. /TASS/. Should artificial intelligence systems ever be developed to the point that they have free will, they could pose an existential threat to mankind, said winner of the prestigious Turing Award for research in machine learning (2018), Yoshua Bengio.

"If we continue on this path, that means we’re going to be creating entities - like us - that don’t want to die, and that may be smarter than us, and that may be smarter than us and that we're not sure if they're going to behave according to our norms and our instructions," he told Axios in an interview.

As an alternative, he suggests developing AI models that will act "as more of a detached scientist than a personal companion or human agent."

He also called for stricter control over the development of AI-technologies. According to him, a scenario where the management of the largest AI system rests with "one person or one company only deciding what to do, or even one government," is unacceptable.

This calls for "very strong checks and balances."

In recent years, some of the world's leading digital technologies experts have expressed concerns that the development of strong AI could lead to serious problems for people. For instance, American billionaire Elon Musk said in 2023 he was worried about the speed of AI development. He called this technology a potential threat to the existence of mankind and compared AI to a double-edged sword that can be used both for good or evil.