Here are some things I believe about artificial intelligence: I believe that over the past several years, A.I. systems have started surpassing humans in a number of domains — math, coding and medical diagnosis, just to name a few — and that they’re getting better every day. I believe that very soon — probably in 2026 or 2027, but possibly as soon as this year — one or more A.I. companies will claim they’ve created an artificial general intelligence, or A.G.I., which is usually defined as something like “a general-purpose A.I. system that can do almost all cognitive tasks a human can do.” I believe that when A.G.I. is announced, there will be debates over definitions and arguments about whether or not it counts as “real” A.G.I., but that these mostly won’t matter, because the broader point — that we are losing our monopoly on human-level intelligence, and transitioning to a world with very powerful A.I. systems in it — will be true. I believe that over the next decade, powerful A.I. will generate trillions of dollars in economic value and tilt the balance of political and military power toward the nations that control it — and that most governments and big corporations already view this as obvious, as evidenced by the huge sums of money they’re spending to get there first.

Full opinion : Three arguments for taking progress toward artificial general intelligence, or A.G.I., more seriously — whether you’re an optimist or a pessimist.