Hinton admitted that he felt a deep sense of sadness about where artificial intelligence (AI) is headed
Geoffrey Hinton, the pioneering computer scientist often called the “Godfather of AI”, says the technology he helped build now fills him with regret, not because of its potential but because the world is not taking its dangers seriously enough.
Speaking to BBC Newsnight, Hinton admitted that he felt a deep sense of sadness about where artificial intelligence (AI) is headed. “It makes me very sad that I put my life into developing this stuff and that it’s now extremely dangerous and people aren’t taking the dangers seriously enough,” he said.
Hinton was instrumental in developing neural networks, the foundation of today’s AI systems. But as these tools become more powerful and widespread, he has emerged as one of its sharpest critics, repeatedly warning that AI could eliminate large numbers of jobs, deepen social instability, and eventually become smarter than humans themselves.
According to Hinton, humanity is nearing an unprecedented moment. “We’ve never been in this situation before of being able to produce things more intelligent than ourselves,” he said. Many researchers, he added, believe AI could surpass human intelligence within the next two decades, and in some narrow fields, it already has.
Once that threshold is crossed, controlling AI may not be as simple as people assume. “The idea that you could just turn it off won’t work,” Hinton warned, suggesting that a sufficiently advanced system could manipulate humans into keeping it running.
The risk of being complacent
He stressed that the biggest risk right now is complacency. If advanced systems are built without safeguards that align them with human values, the consequences could be catastrophic. “If we create them so they don’t care about us,” he cautioned, “they will probably wipe us out.”
Still, Hinton does not believe disaster is inevitable. He argues that outcomes depend heavily on how AI is designed, trained, and governed, and that humans still have time to make better choices. He urged greater investment in research focused on how people can safely coexist with intelligent machines.
Hinton is also troubled by the broader global context in which AI is being rolled out. With international cooperation weakening and authoritarian politics gaining ground, he fears meaningful regulation will be hard to achieve. He compared the situation to the early days of nuclear and chemical weapons, when global agreements became necessary to prevent widespread harm.
Despite everything, Hinton says he does not regret his role in AI’s development. “It would have been developed without me,” he said, adding that he would make the same decisions again if placed back in the same moment.
Hinton remains optimistic about AI’s ability to transform areas like education and healthcare, pointing to AI tutors and breakthroughs in medical imaging as clear benefits. But for now, he believes the priority must be caution. “We’re at a very crucial point in history,” he said. “We haven’t done the research to figure out if we can peacefully coexist with them. It’s crucial we do that research.”
Curated by Shiv Shakti Mishra
