Safe baby AGI

Abstract

Out of fear that artificial general intelligence (AGI) might pose a future risk to human existence, some have suggested slowing or stopping AGI research, to allow time for theoretical work to guarantee its safety. Since an AGI system will necessarily be a complex closed-loop learning controller that lives and works in semi-stochastic environments, its behaviors are not fully determined by its design and initial state, so no mathematico-logical guarantees can be provided for its safety. Until actual running AGI systems exist – and there is as of yet no consensus on how to create them – that can be thoroughly analyzed and studied, any proposal on their safety can only be based on weak conjecture. As any practical AGI will unavoidably start in a relatively harmless baby-like state, subject to the nurture and education that we provide, we argue that our best hope to get safe AGI is to provide it proper education.