Recording intelligenceAI-generated brief · check the source for context

Sir Demis Hassabis on the AI Revolution, the Future of AI and Human Creativity | Hannah Fry

1:02:54 recording · EN · 3 speakers

Watch the original

Brief overview

The RSA awards Demis Hassabis the Albert Medal, and he argues society must intentionally shape AI.

  1. AlphaFold did 262 million protein shapes, given away freeJoseph said one protein structure could take a scientist years, sometimes a whole career, and the same problem had been attacked the same way for 50 years.
  2. Creativity separates good scientists from great onesHassabis said his whole formal training was scientific and logical, but at heart he is led creatively, intuitively and emotionally.
  3. The future is not written, so shape it intentionallyHe said no technologist knows what will happen, and that the economics and the philosophical questions will be the biggest challenges.
Executive Summary AI
  • David Joseph, CEO of the Royal Society of Arts, opens the evening in the Great Room, where Alexander Graham Bell showed the telephone in 1877, Sir William Cook unveiled the electric telegraph and Edison's light bulb was first shown to the British public.
  • He traces the Albert Medal from its first award in 1864 to Roland Hill, whose penny post let a letter go anywhere in the country for a penny, through Marie Curie, Winston Churchill in 1945, Stephen Hawking, Tim Berners-Lee and Sarah Gilbert.
  • Introducing this year's recipient, Joseph explains that getting the shape of a single protein could take a scientist a whole career, that AlphaFold has now done 262 million of them, and that Hassabis gave every one away free to every researcher on earth.
  • Accepting the medal, Hassabis says AI will be a revolution perhaps ten times the impact of the Industrial Revolution but unfolding over a decade instead of a century, and that the arts and humanities, not the technologists, must define what we value in that era.
  • Answering audience questions from Kate Farrer, Thomas Heatherwick and Usha, he sides with Turing over Penrose on computability, calls for beautiful buildings including data centres, and recommends inverting the classroom so rote learning happens out of class with personalised AI tutors.
Key Quote
“And he gave every single one away free to every researcher on earth.”
— David Joseph
Key Quote
“He says, there is no 50% mode in Demis, right?”
— Hannah Fry
Key Quote
“I don't think society is ready yet for what's coming.”
— Demis Hassabis