Bill Gates, the Microsoft (MS) co-founder, urged the international community to mount a joint response, saying artificial intelligence (AI) could rapidly upend jobs and the social order.
Gates, in a 12-page essay posted on his personal blog on the 26th (local time), predicted that the AI transition will take full shape within the next 10 years. Unlike the Industrial Revolution in the past, the change will unfold over a very short period, he said, but governments and societies are ill-prepared to respond.
He cited major risks including a large drop in employment, the spread of crimes that exploit AI, and negative effects on children's development and relationships. He said that once AI can perform tasks without human review, it could replace workers across occupations, including law, medicine, customer service, and manufacturing.
As alternatives, he proposed "human-only zones" that limit AI adoption in fields where human empathy is crucial, such as caregiving, childcare, and mental health care. He also suggested taxing the use of robots and AI to modulate the pace of automation and channeling the funds raised into retraining displaced workers and expanding the social safety net.
Gates stressed the need to create an international AI regulatory body similar to the nuclear nonproliferation regime and for the United States and China to cooperate on common standards. He also urged schools to build the ability to discern deepfakes and AI-driven misinformation. He said he would donate revenue from his technology investments to the Gates Foundation to support the public-interest use of AI.
The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) said the essay struck a more cautionary tone than his 2023 op-ed that expressed optimism about the AI revolution. Gates Ventures said that while Gates actively uses AI in his research, this essay was written directly without AI assistance.