Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong against AI pause open letter

Brian Armstrong took on Twitter to advocate for AI progress, responding to the open letter from big business on the proposed AI pause. He said stopping Chat GPT development is a “bad idea” and that fear shouldn’t get in the way.

Related: Elon Musk calls for AI bridle

On March 29, the Future of Life Institute published an open letter titled “Pause Giant AI Experiments: An Open Letter,” signed by Elon Musk, CEO of SpaceX, Tesla, and Twitter; Steve Wozniak, co-founder of Apple; Bill Gates, co-founder of Microsoft; and Gary Marcus, AI researcher and professor emeritus at New York University.

The open letter states:

AI systems with human-competitive intelligence can pose profound risks to society and humanity, as shown by extensive research and acknowledged by top AI labs. As stated in the widely-endorsed Asilomar AI Principles, Advanced AI could represent a profound change in the history of life on Earth, and should be planned for and managed with commensurate care and resources.

The authors call for at least a six-month pause in further development of AI systems until everyone is “confident that their effects will be positive and their risks will be manageable.” If these measures cannot be implemented within the specified time frame, “governments should step in and institute a moratorium.”

Brian Armstrong, CEO of crypto exchange Coinbase, is against this idea and says that:

There are no “experts” to adjudicate this issue, and many disparate actors will never agree. Committees and bureaucracy won’t solve anything.

While the open letter highlights the current flaws of AI, saying it “should be refocused on making today’s powerful, state-of-the-art systems more accurate, safe, interpretable, transparent, robust, aligned, trustworthy, and loyal,” Brian Armstrong believes that “as with many technologies, there are dangers, but we should keep marching forward with progress because the good outweighs the bad.”

Armstrong further adds:

Don’t ever let fear stop progress, and be wary of anyone trying to capture control in some central authority.

A person commented on Armstrong’s post: