The “Age of Compute” Committees

Exploring Content & Building Community

Zoom Meetings Leading up to the September Event

#1 - The “Age of Compute” Committees

“Exploring AGI: The Human Mind + Artificial Intelligence”

On the theoretical “Turing Scale of AGI” with a Benchmark rating of 10+ as “Achievement Beyond AGI,” our “Age of Compute Committee” will provide leadership in evaluating the benchmarks toward "Superintelligence.” While our goals may prove elusive, the journey should provide huge benefits. A “Mission to Mars” or “Moon Landing” have clear indicators of "Achievement," but as AI enables science to approach “Omnipresent Healthcare,” the indicators of success are clearly a trajectory, a part of the process. The ability for AI to achieve “Nobel Level Scientific Achievement” or a “Nobel Level Achievement in the Arts,” a novel “Beyond Melville or Tolstoy,” such output would be very much in doubt. But clearly, one day AI will develop a “Nationwide Energy Grid” and provide a clean energy supply, and it will likely happen in our lifetime. Will an AI be able to imagine food and nutrition and provide an understanding of cuisine that would merit Michelin Five Stars? Such an achievement would certainly indicate the arrival of AGI, but more likely misses the point of this exercise. Our committee we seek to organize its own set of benchmarks to help “Identify,” and “Recognize” various “Achievements of Human and AI Collaboration.” This will not be a simple task. Sometimes what appears clear can become fascinatingly obscure. 

#2 - The “Age of Compute” Committee

"The Road to AGI: The Data Godzilla - Feeding the Monster”

Imagine an industry, not unlike “Formula 1 Racing,” where the competition is fierce, where pride in design and performance is as great as the goal of power and speed. Imagine that the participants see themselves as visionaries and poets while their organizations classify them as physicists, engineers and computer scientists. And finally, imagine this industry emerging from total academic obscurity into a world prominence, of “Global Visionaries and Billionaires.” In many ways, it is not dissimilar to the “California Gold Rush of ‘49” or the “Klondike Gold Rush of ’96.” But this is the “Race to AGI in the 2020s” and the “Golden Nuggets Mined,” are hidden in the “Mining of Data,” the words, thoughts, notions and visuals created during the entire “History of Man.” And an additionally fascinating quirk about in this industry, there are no imposters. There may be “Villains,” what would a great story be without a whiff of a villain. But “The Age of Compute” is populated by intense and idiosyncratic scientists, neurotic inventors and over-the-top innovators all forging their own pathways. And all are more than aware that they are “Feeding the Monster,” flirting with the most “Dangerous Super-Science” since Los Alamos. But still each day they confront and defy, “The Data Godzilla,” never fully knowing the outcome. "Training Supercomputers," assembling data from all available sources on the Internet, and merging it algorithmically, creating layers of “Synthetic Data."  This is the "Frontier Model Alchemy," the magnificent brew, the undeniable “Challenge of Our Time.”

#3 - The “Age of Compute” Committee:

Compute as Currency: GPUs, TPUs & Quantum Accelerators

The “Historical Currency” of ancient Greece resides is the names of Socrates, Plato, Aristotle and its contributions of “Theater, Democracy and Philosophy.” Italy produced the Opera, Renaissance and Baroque Architecture and in the 20th Century, magnificent luxury brands such as Gucci, Prada and Ferrari. Cultures produce “Historical Heritage,” “Economic Wealth,” “Intellectual and Human Capital,” and in the 21st Century, for better or worse, a new and until now, unthinkable measure of wealth has emerged, the driver of “Artificial Intelligence, “Compute as a Global Currency.” Without “Massive Compute Power” the “AI Networks” that drive modern civilization will not function. In the same way that “Data Center Markets” are categorized, countries or regions will similarly be referred to with terminology such as “Tier 1 Compute Capability,” or ‘Tier 2 Compute Capability.” Today we have an economic world composed of BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa); the EU, the US etc. Tomorrow the “Global Breakdown” may well be measured by “The Power of Compute.”  And the economic viability of a city, state, country or even a continent will depend on GPUs, TPUs and Quantum Accelerators.