AI’s worst disasters will arrive unannounced | Letters

Dr Simon Nieder on the global efforts needed to curb the threats posed by AI. Plus letters from Dr Anthony Harris and David Kyler Timothy Garton Ash is right that serious artificial intelligence risks demand international action, but “AI Hiroshima” may be the wrong picture (Would even an AI disaster on the scale of Hiroshima be enough to make humankind protect itself? I fear not, 22 August). Hiroshima was not technology going rogue. Human beings designed the bomb, authorised its use and dropped it. The technology worked much as intended. AI may one day behave in ways we cannot control, but many of the gravest harms could happen without any dramatic moment when “the AI takes over”. AI might help design a pathogen, find a vulnerability in critical infrastructure or improve a weapons system while people still decide what happens next. Other harms may build almost invisibly through thousands of ordinary decisions – more autonomy here, one safeguard removed there, another consequential task handed over because the system has worked well so far. By the time the danger is obvious, the important decisions may already have been made. That is also where international agreement cou