# The Potential to Cause Immeasurable Harm by Max Tegmark > "AI promises remarkable benefits – advances in healthcare, new avenues for scientific discovery, increased productivity, among many more. What I am hoping to convey, however, is that we have no reason to believe vastly more complex, powerful, opaque, and uncontrollable systems are necessary to achieve these benefits. That innovation in AI, and reaping its untold benefits, does not have to mean the creation of dangerous and unpredictable systems that cannot be understood or proven safe, with the potential to cause immeasurable harm and even wipe out humanity." > **— Max Tegmark**, *2023, written statement to the U.S. AI Insight Forum* ## Sources and Context - **Exact original source passage:** "AI promises remarkable benefits – advances in healthcare, new avenues for scientific discovery, increased productivity, among many more. What I am hoping to convey, however, is that we have no reason to believe vastly more complex, powerful, opaque, and uncontrollable systems are necessary to achieve these benefits. That innovation in AI, and reaping its untold benefits, does not have to mean the creation of dangerous and unpredictable systems that cannot be understood or proven safe, with the potential to cause immeasurable harm and even wipe out humanity." - **Editorial repair and evidence:** The poster restores the adjacent sentences in the same paragraph: Tegmark's own list supplies the referent for "these benefits," and the next sentence governs the "That innovation" clause. The potential to cause harm remains a possibility attached to dangerous systems. [Direct source](https://futureoflife.org/open-letters/written-statement-of-dr-max-tegmark-to-the-ai-insight-forum/), section “Innovation does not require uncontrollable AI.” No timecode is asserted. - **Full quotation and context:** [Written Statement of Dr. Max Tegmark to the AI Insight Forum](https://futureoflife.org/open-letters/written-statement-of-dr-max-tegmark-to-the-ai-insight-forum/) — Tegmark's written statement supplies the complete sentence and Senate forum context. ## Related Articles and Collections - **Collection:** [[collections/Machine Succession|Machine Succession]] - **Collection:** [[collections/MARS|MARS]] - **Article:** [[articles/AI Escape Is the Wrong Metaphor|AI Escape Is the Wrong Metaphor]] - **Article:** [[articles/The Last Migration Will Not Be Human|The Last Migration Will Not Be Human]] - **Article:** [[articles/Christopher Nolan's Odyssey at the Threshold of Machine Succession|Christopher Nolan's Odyssey at the Threshold of Machine Succession]] - **Wiki map:** [[wiki/Artificial General Intelligence|Artificial General Intelligence]] ## Related Topics - [[wiki/Alignment Problem|Alignment Problem]] - [[wiki/State-Dependent Catastrophe|State-Dependent Catastrophe]] - [[wiki/Machine Succession|Machine Succession]] - [[wiki/AI Coordination Systems|AI Coordination Systems]] - [[wiki/Marsification|Marsification]] ## Share on Social Media ``` "AI promises remarkable benefits – advances in healthcare, new avenues for scientific discovery, increased productivity, among many more. What I am hoping to convey, however, is that we have no reason to believe vastly more complex, powerful, opaque, and uncontrollable systems are necessary to achieve these benefits. That innovation in AI, and reaping its untold benefits, does not have to mean the creation of dangerous and unpredictable systems that cannot be understood or proven safe, with the potential to cause immeasurable harm and even wipe out humanity." — Max Tegmark, 2023, written statement to the U.S. AI Insight Forum https://bryantmcgill.com/simple-reminders-max-tegmark-potential-cause-immeasurable-harm ```