Artificial intelligence is all the rage today, with the emerging technology making its way into multiple aspects of business and life.
Yet, while many companies are touting the immense benefits that AI technology can bring to not only their operations but life in general, a majority of Americans believe that AI is actually a real threat to human civilization.
A new poll conducted by Reuters/Ipsos that was released this week shows that 61% of all U.S. residents believe that AI is a real threat to the future of humanity. Only 22% of people who participated in the poll said they disagreed with that statement, while the remaining 17% said they weren’t sure.
That’s quite the statement that Americans made – with a whopping 83% of all people either believing that AI is a threat to the future of humanity or at least open to the possibility that it could be.
The poll showed that people who voted for former President Donald Trump in the 20202 presidential election were more likely to have major concerns over the looming threat that AI brings. Roughly 70% of these people agreed that AI could be a threat to humanity.
While the percentage of people who voted for President Joe Biden in 2020 and agreed with that statement was lower than that of Trump’s voters, it was still high. A total of 60% of Biden voters agreed that AI could threaten humanity.
Non-Evangelical Christian voters reported levels of concern about AI that were lower than their Evangelical Christian counterparts.
The poll reported that 32% of Evangelical Christians responded that they “strongly agree” that AI could threaten humankind, while 24% of non-Evangelical Christians agreed with that statement.
This new poll shows clear as day how concerned a wide variety of people in the U.S. are about the future of AI and what it could do for humanity – in a bad way. It’s telling because these people don’t have a vested interest in the development of AI, like some of the other people who have already sounded the alarm about the technology.
Many lawmakers and tech experts have said they are very concerned about negative effects that AI technology could potentially bring.
One of the most prominent is Elon Musk, the owner of Tesla, SpaceX and Twitter. He is leading a group of tech experts that have called for developers to put a pause on new AI developments for six months, as there are serious “risks to society” that exist with the emerging technology.
Speaking with CNBC earlier this week, Musk said there’s a chance AI “goes wrong and destroys humanity.” He even said that the technology is a “double-edged sword,” since it is very hard to predict what the future holds for AI.
Despite all this concern, many tech companies are forging ahead with new AI programs that are available to the masses, such as ChatGPT.
