AI Acceleration. Fast, slow and how will it impact GDP

Notes on a panel discussion about rate of change of AI technology, impacts on the economy, safety and governance hosted by Inference Magazine (Jack Wiseman). These notes were taken under Chatham House rule so there is no attribution. The notes have been edited with GPT and may contain errors. Certain points argue with each other as panellists disagreed at times. In attendance on the panel: Tyler Cowen (economist), Mike Webb (eco, tech policy ex deepmind), Tom Davidson (AI governance, Forethought Inst), and Connor Leahy (AI safety, alignment Conjecture). AI may be the defining force of this generation, potentially even more transformative than electricity or the internet. A key unknown is whether AI is a general-purpose technology (GPT) like computing, or something fundamentally different and more disruptive. One speaker framed the central question as: "Will AI automate itself and thereby transform research, technology, and the economy in a rapid cascade?" There was an urgent call for i

Notes on a panel discussion about rate of change of AI technology, impacts on the economy, safety and governance hosted by Inference Magazine (Jack Wiseman). These notes were taken under Chatham House rule so there is no attribution. The notes have been edited with GPT and may contain errors. Certain points argue with each other as panellists disagreed at times. In attendance on the panel: Tyler Cowen (economist), Mike Webb (eco, tech policy ex deepmind), Tom Davidson (AI governance, Forethought Inst), and Connor Leahy (AI safety, alignment Conjecture). AI may be the defining force of this gen