‘Godfather of AI’ Corrects NYT Coverage, Defends Google’s AI Program

Ari Blaff
·4 min read
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Geoffrey Hinton, whom many call “the Godfather of AI,” slammed the New York Times following a profile that allegedly misinterpreted his decision to leave Google as one borne of anger for the firm’s disregard for the potential dangers the technology poses to humanity.

“In the NYT today, Cade Metz implies that I left Google so that I could criticize Google. Actually, I left so that I could talk about the dangers of AI without considering how this impacts Google. Google has acted very responsibly,” Hinton tweeted on Monday morning.

The article, which has remained on the Times homepage throughout Monday, framed Hinton’s decision to leave Google as an ethical necessity. “On Monday,” Metz writes, Hinton “officially joined a growing chorus of critics who say those companies are racing toward danger with their aggressive campaign to create products based on generative artificial intelligence, the technology that powers popular chatbots like ChatGPT.

“Dr. Hinton said he has quit his job at Google, where he has worked for more than [a] decade and became one of the most respected voices in the field, so he can freely speak out about the risks of A.I. A part of him, he said, now regrets his life’s work,” Metz added.

Google released a statement reaffirming the company’s commitment to an ethical approach to AI. “We remain committed to a responsible approach to A.I. We’re continually learning to understand emerging risks while also innovating boldly,” Google’s chief scientist Jeff Dean told the Times. The firm acquired the company, DNNresearch Inc., that Hinton and two graduate students from the University of Toronto created for $44 million in 2012.

The article comes just weeks after Elon Musk’s accused the tech giant of similarly ignoring the threat of AI.

“Google and DeepMind together had about three-quarters of all the AI talent in the world. They obviously had a tremendous amount of money and more computers than anyone else. So I’m like we’re in a unipolar world where there’s just one company that has close to a monopoly on AI talent and computers,” Musk told Tucker Carlson on Fox News. “And the person in charge doesn’t seem to care about safety. This is not good.”

Musk singled out Google co-founder, Larry Page, for being responsible for the company’s policy on AI. “He’s made many public statements over the years that the whole goal of Google is what’s called AGI artificial general intelligence or artificial super intelligence,” Musk said.

Some influencers in the technology and AI space have downplayed the article, insisting that Metz’s treatment was not misleading.

“I read and interpreted Care Metz NY Times article the way you meant: you left Google to speak more freely about AI and its potential dangers, and at no point, I felt you criticised Google. For what it’s worth,” Spiros Margaris, a venture capitalist, responded to Hinton.

The comment prompted Hinton to clarify: “Maybe I over-reacted. When I read it I thought it could easily be interpreted as implying that I left so that I could criticize Google and that is certainly not the case.”

Hinton further defended the Times after another user denounced the outlet as “garbage.” “NYT is definitely not garbage. It has great reporters. I was just correcting a nuance,” the technologist concluded.

The AI researcher has been a leading critic of the uncritical embrace of AI, often warning of the technologies shortcomings. “Look at how it was five years ago and how it is now,” Hinton told the Times. “Take the difference and propagate it forwards. That’s scary.”

“It is hard to see how you can prevent the bad actors from using it for bad things,” he added.

Metz has yet to officially address the criticism publicly.

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