AI cooperation
Google to open artificial intelligence research center in Beijing
“China is a rising power in the field of AI work and research,” says Fei-Fei Li, the chief scientist of Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning at Google Cloud, while calling for enhanced AI cooperation between major powers.
Li made the remarks in a recent interview at Google’s Beijing office.
In early December, Li said that Google would launch a new AI research center in Beijing, as part of its AI First strategy.
When asked what prompted Google to open its center in the Chinese capital, Li says: “We all recognize the importance of China because of its talent, and because of the incredible creativity and innovation that is already going on here.”
The Google AI China Center, the first of its kind in Asia, will primarily focus on basic AI research.
“We’ve seen China paying a lot of attention to AI in terms of research, entrepreneurship, usage in industry as well as government support,” says Li, noting that the Chinese government issued a plan for the development of “the new generation of AI” in July, and recently announced a threeyear action plan.
“China is really a rising power, with more prominent global responsibility in technology, politics and culture,” says the leading AI expert, adding that promoting cooperation between major countries will bring “extraordinary benefits” to humankind.
She acknowledged that AI is viewed by some as a new source of competition between countries. However, as a scientist, Li says she believes science has no national boundaries, and she hopes to see more cooperation and communication across borders.
Li also notes there is a shortage worldwide of AI talent, whether in the United States or in China.
“I hope to mobilize more global talent to participate in AI research because it is such an important field of science and technology,” she says.
Asked about the potential for women in the sector, the female scientist says more work is needed. “AI will change the world, but who will change AI? We want AI to be more inclusive and diverse.”
Li, who is also the director of the Stanford Artificial Intelligence Lab, has made a successful transition from academia.
“I see the historical moment AI is experiencing: It has stepped out of the lab and has entered the stage of industrial applications,” she says.
Li is certainly at the heart of the historical moment.
“I hope to bring AI technology to most people and most industries,” she says, adding that this will have a profound impact on daily life.
Li says technology in this area has become relatively mature, especially facial recognition and object tracking technology, which have been used in smart shopping, driverless cars and medical imaging and pathological analysis.
Potential application scenarios for AI are countless, says Li.
And financial services, media and entertainment, business, medicine, energy, education, and manufacturing, are among the sectors deemed especially ripe for future growth.
“AI’s use in the development of these industries has just started, but look at the massive demand,” she says.
As for entirely new industries that might be spawned through AI, Li says: “When John von Neumann came up with the idea of a computer, few people thought software engineering would become an industry. We need an adequate imagination.”
Commenting on the recent debate on whether AI will one day replace human intelligence, Li says the threat is overblown.
She cites a famous saying from the 1970s to clarify her view: The definition of today’s AI is a computer that can make a perfect chess move while the room is on fire.
This means AI can accomplish plenty, such as memorizing 3,000 car models, but it doesn’t understand the environment and context of every scenario, says Li.
“As a scientist, I want to keep the humbleness when I think about AI as a science as well as a technology,” says Li. “So it’s important to recognize AI as a very young field. It still has a lot of open questions and challenges.”
However, AI can play an important role in many areas with more human-machine cooperation, says Li.
Referring to the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake and 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster, she says robots would have been more practical as a replacement to humans undertaking dangerous disaster relief work.
Smart machines can also assist human beings in repetitive labor, Li says.
For example, doctors can only diagnose a limited number of medical images, but machines can process a lot more at a likely lower cost and within a shorter time. This would allow doctors to conduct more valuable research and communicate more with patients, work that can’t be done by AI.
“Machines don’t have independent value,” says Li. “The value of machines is the value of human beings.”
So it’s important to recognize AI as a very young field. It still has a lot of open questions and challenges.” Fei-Fei Li, a US-based AI scientist