Key figures in artificial intelligence want training of powerful AI systems to be suspended amid fears of a threat to humanity.
They have signed an open letter warning of potential risks, and say the race to develop AI systems is out of control.
Twitter chief Elon Musk is among those who want training of AIs above a certain capacity to be halted for at least six months.
Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak and some researchers at DeepMind also signed.
OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, recently released GPT-4 – a state-of-the-art technology, which has impressed observers with its ability to do tasks such as answering questions about objects in images.
The letter, from Future of Life Institute and signed by the luminaries, wants development to be halted temporarily at that level, warning in their letter of the risks future, more advanced systems might pose.
“AI systems with human-competitive intelligence can pose profound risks to society and humanity,” it says.
The Future of Life Institute is a not-for-profit organisation which says its mission is to “steer transformative technologies away from extreme, large-scale risks and towards benefiting life”.
Mr Musk, owner of Twitter and chief executive of car company Tesla, is listed as an external adviser to the organisation.
Advanced AIs need to be developed with care, the letter says, but instead, “recent months have seen AI labs locked in an out-of-control race to develop and deploy ever more powerful digital minds that no-one – not even their creators – can understand, predict, or reliably control”.
The letter warns that AIs could flood information channels with misinformation, and replace jobs with automation. (BBC)