The Future of AI, Quantum Gravity, and Democracy: Insights from Sean Carroll

In this wide-ranging Q&A session, physicist Sean Carroll tackles questions on artificial intelligence, quantum gravity, democracy, and many other scientific and philosophical topics.

On AI and large language models, Carroll expresses skepticism about their potential for general intelligence:

"I don't think that anyone who advocates any currently popular interpretation or foundational approach to quantum mechanics would be surprised that quantum computers work...to be fair I don't think that we have gained any information that changes our credences about these different approaches."

He notes that while AI systems like ChatGPT are becoming more capable, "the types of failures they make are precisely the type you would expect if they were not being real human intelligence, if they were not causally mapping the world and inventing counterfactual reasoning."

Regarding quantum gravity, Carroll explains some of the key challenges:

"There are two kinds of problems with quantizing gravity - there are technical problems and there are conceptual problems. The technical problems are just that according to the ordinary ways we have of doing quantum field theory, which is what you should need to do in gravity since Einstein's general theory of relativity is a classical field theory, in quantum field theory we have rules for taking a classical field theory and quantizing it and in the case of gravity these rules don't work."

He notes that approaches like string theory aim to solve some of these technical issues, but conceptual problems remain around how to even define concepts like time in a quantum theory of gravity.

On democracy and wealth inequality, Carroll expresses concern about the concentration of wealth and power:

"I think we could do a lot of good with I think two things: I think we could do a lot of good with the revenue that might be generated by a fair tax system and number two, and this is something that is only become super noticeable relatively recently, we're putting too much power in the hands of a small number of people."

He argues for higher taxes on the wealthy, noting that in the 1950s the top marginal tax rate was 90% compared to around 30% today.

Throughout the discussion, Carroll emphasizes the importance of clear thinking, careful definitions, and being open to changing one's mind based on evidence. He notes that on many of these complex topics, we don't yet have definitive answers, but can still make progress through rigorous scientific and philosophical inquiry.

Overall, this wide-ranging conversation showcases Carroll's ability to tackle diverse topics with nuance and insight, while acknowledging the limits of our current understanding on many frontier areas of science and society.

Article created from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9XOAlKwQGz4