From Pursuit of the Universal AGI Architecture to Systematic Approach to Heterogeneous AGI (SAGI): Addressing Alignment, Energy & AGI Grand Challenges

Abstract

Artificial intelligence (AI) faces a trifecta of grand challenges: the Energy Wall, the Alignment Problem and the Leap from Narrow AI to AGI. Contemporary AI solutions consume unsustainable amounts of energy during model training and daily operations. Making things worse, the amount of computation required to train each new AI model has been doubling every 2 months since 2020, directly translating to unprecedented increases in energy consumption. The leap from AI to AGI requires multiple functional subsystems operating in a balanced manner, which requires a system architecture. However, the current approach to AI lacks system design; even though system characteristics play a key role in the human brain; from the way it processes information to how it makes decisions. In this paper, we posit that system design is the missing piece in overcoming current AI the grand challenges. We present a Systematic Approach to AGI (SAGI) that utilizes system design principles to overcome the energy wall and the alignment challenges. This paper asserts that artificial intelligence can be realized through a multiplicity of design-specific pathways, rather than a singular, overarching AGI architecture. AGI systems may exhibit diverse architectural configurations and capabilities, contingent upon their intended use cases. We argue that AI alignment, the most difficult among the grand challenges, is not attainable without a way to reflect the complexity of the human moral system and its subsystems in the AGI architectures. We claim that AGI approaches such as symbolicism, connectionism and others are not fundamental to AGI but emergent from the system design processes. Hence, we focus on employing system design principles as a guiding framework, rather than solely concentrating on a universal AGI architecture.