Jeffrey Hinton is described as the "godfather of artificial intelligence", his work on the development of artificial neural networks revolutionized the world of modern technology, and his work is considered a cornerstone for the development of machines similar to the human brain, characterized by independence from their programmers in the future.

Despite Hinton becoming famous in recent years, he decided to announce his resignation from Google in 2023, partly regretting working in artificial intelligence, warning of risks that could later become out of human control.

Who is Jeffrey Hinton?

Jeffrey Hinton was born on December 6, 1947, in London, United Kingdom.

He studied experimental psychology and received a bachelor's degree from King's College Cambridge in 1970.

He later decided to continue his studies at the University of Edinburgh, but this time he chose the field of artificial intelligence, where he received his PhD in 1978.

After his Ph.D., Hinton worked at the University of Sussex and then moved on to work at the University of California and Carnegie Mellon University in the United States.

He was also the founding director of the Computational Neuroscience Unit of the Gatsby Foundation at University College London.

However, it wasn't until 2013 that the British-Canadian scientist became famous when he began working on artificial neural networks.

He spent time working at Google Brain and the University of Toronto, where he was a professor in the Department of Computer Science.

Hinton holds a research chair in Canada on machine learning and became a consultant for the Machine and Brain Learning Program at the Canadian Institute for Advanced Research.

Hinton co-founded and became its chief scientific advisor to the Vector, one of the leading AI research institutes.

The Godfather of Artificial Intelligence and Deep Learning

Hinton is seen as a leading figure in deep learning, a new field of research that deals with finding theories and algorithms that allow a machine to learn on its own, by simulating neurons in the human body.

Hinton's groundbreaking research on neural networks and deep learning has paved the way for existing artificial intelligence systems such as ChatGPT.

For his efforts in this field, Hinton received the 2018 Turing Award, along with Joshua Bengiu and Yan Lecon, and these three are now referred to as the "godfathers of artificial intelligence" and "godfathers of deep learning."

Hinton has written dozens of papers in deep learning and artificial intelligence, focusing on ways neural networks are used for machine learning, memory, perception and symbol processing.

At the NeurIPS conference, Hinton presented a new educational algorithm for neural networks, called the Forward-Forward algorithm, which was a revolutionary innovation in the field.

Jeffrey Hinton co-created with David Ackley and Terry Segnowski the Boltzmann machine, a type of artificial neural network that has the ability to learn generatively, extract key characteristics from data and make decisions.

Regretful of artificial intelligence

Despite being the "godfather of artificial intelligence," Hinton warned of its dangers, even stating that he "regrets working in this field," and this regret was the reason that led him to resign from Google in May 2023, justifying his decision by saying that he wanted to "talk freely about the dangers of artificial intelligence."

Indeed, after his resignation, Hinton began talking about the dangers of artificial intelligence, technological unemployment, and the deliberate misuse of this innovation by what he described as "malicious."

In a television interview, Hinton revealed that artificial intelligence "may soon exceed the informational capacity of the human brain," and described some of the risks posed by these chatbots as "very scary."

Jeffrey Hinton justified his resignation from Google by saying he wanted to talk freely about the dangers of artificial intelligence (Reuters)

Hinton explained that chatbots have the ability to learn independently and share knowledge, which means that whenever one copy gets new information, it is automatically disseminated to the entire group.

This allows AI-powered chatbots to accumulate knowledge beyond the capacity of any human being.

Hinton went even further, noting that he does not rule out that artificial intelligence could "wipe out humanity."

He added that despite the great benefits of artificial intelligence systems in all fields, including military and economic, he is concerned that these systems set themselves sub-goals that are not in line with the interests of their programmers.

Catastrophic misuse and economic repercussions

Hinton's biggest concern is the catastrophic misuse of AI systems by "malicious" actors who he said could exploit AI for bad purposes.

Hinton has been a leading proponent since 2017 of a ban on lethal autonomous weapons.

As for the economic impacts of AI, Hinton has been optimistic about it in the past, stating in 2018 that AI will never replace humans. By 2023, his view had changed, and he was worried about its negative impact on the labor market.

Hinton Awards

Due to his many contributions to the fields of artificial intelligence and deep learning, it is only natural that Jeffrey Hinton has won many awards from the beginning of his career until today.

In 1998 Hinton was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS), and was the first winner of the Rummelhart Prize in Cognitive Science in 2001.

In the same year, Hinton received an honorary doctorate from the University of Edinburgh.

In 2005, he received the IJCAI Research Excellence Award, a lifetime achievement award.

Hinton was also awarded the 2011 Herzburg Canada Gold Medal in Science and Engineering, and in 2013 was awarded an honorary doctorate from the University of Sherbrooke.

In 2016, he was elected a foreign member of the National Academy of Engineering, "for his contributions to the theory and practice of artificial neural networks."

He also received the 2016 IEEE/RSE Wolfson James Clerk Maxwell Award.

In the same year, he won the BBVA Foundation Frontiers of Knowledge Award, in the ICT category, for his pioneering and highly influential work on giving machines the ability to learn.

As already mentioned, Hinton won the 2018 Turing Award, along with Yoshua Bengiu and Yan Licon, for their work on neural network development in computing.

Finally, in 2022, he received the Princess of Asturias Award in the scientific research category, along with Jan Cuon, Joshua Bengio and Demes Hassabis, one of the most prestigious awards in Spain.