Renowned award-winning computer scientist Yoshua Bengio has warned that artificial intelligence could turn against humanity. This warning comes as the use of AI is at an all-time high.

Bengio is best known for his pioneering work in deep learning, which earned him the 2018 A.M. Turing Award, known as “the Nobel Prize of Computing,” with scientists Geoffrey Hinton and Yann LeCun. In 2019, he was awarded the Killam Prize, and in 2022 became the computer scientist with the highest impact in the world as measured by h-index.

Bengio, who is also a professor at the University of Montreal and head of the Montreal Institute for Learning Algorithms, told CNBC on Thursday that machines could soon have most of the cognitive abilities of humans and that rapid development of artificial intelligence (AI) could pose grave risks to humanity as it becomes harder to control.

The scientist was referring to artificial general intelligence (AGI), a type of AI technology that aims to equal or become better than human intellect. “Intelligence gives power. So, who’s going to control that power?” Bengio said, according to RT. “There are people who might want to abuse that power, and there are people who might be happy to see humanity replaced by machines,” he said, calling for stricter regulation.

Bengio wants the ruling class to take control of what parameters are available to AI, and that will never be a good thing. The governments of the world have only ever used their power to amass wealth and slaughter others during war. That won’t change if they grab power over all technology. However, at the same time, he pointed out that a limited number of organizations and governments could afford to build powerful and costly AI machines. This would lead to a concentration of economic, political, and military power, eventually threatening the geopolitical stability worldwide, he warned.

“If we create entities that are smarter than us and have their own goals, what does that mean for humanity? Are we in danger?” Bengio asked.

This warning comes as Elon Musk also predicts the “rise of the machines,” while the father of artificial intelligence predicted singularity when machines will outlearn humans in 30 years.

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