site.btaVinton Cerf: Psychologists Should Advise Computer Professionals on Technology's Impact on Society

Economists, psychologists, neuroscientists, many experts should advise computer professionals on technology's impact on society, said Vinton Cerf, one of the fathers of the Internet, in response to a question by BTA's Antoaneta Markova during a meeting with journalists in Heidelberg, Germany. He was asked whether he had asked himself, early in his career in computer science, the ethical and philosophical questions that arise today with the development of the Internet, social networks and artificial intelligence. 

Cerf was among the participants in the 11th Heidelberg Laureate Forum, which took place in Heidelberg in late September 2024. 

In his words, he hadn't thought about what could go wrong in that regard. At that time, 50 years ago, they were just trying to make the global network work and develop it. If he had worried too much then, he doubts they would have been able to develop the network that far. At that time, however, the people using the Internet were few, mostly engineers trying to build the network.

But even at the dawn of the Internet they started to see the dynamics, some of the social impacts of the web, he added. Email was created in 1971, and for those who used it, it was a really useful tool. It allowed them to work together across time zones - he would send someone a message while they were sleeping and they would reply while he was sleeping. So they could work together despite the fact that they slept at different times. At the time, Cerf thought we wouldn't have to travel anymore, but it turned out he was wrong. The travel budget actually increased. It was because they could work in different time zones that more people from different parts of the world got involved in the development, and when they had to get together they all had to travel from far-away destinations. 

Over time, it became clear that they needed to be very clear about the social and economic implications of the development of these technologies. Today, they need an economist, a psychologist, neuroscientists on their teams to help them understand what the impact of computer technology is on human society. Work remains to be done in that regard, Cerf said. 

The winner of the Turing Prize, considered the Nobel Prize for computer science, stressed that the Internet does not distinguish between good and bad information. The web simply spreads it and so amplifies its influence, just as people do on social networks. The question is how to react to this. There are various attempts by governments to recognise that there is harm, and to try to introduce rules. The problem is that rules may fail to solve the problem. Technical rules won't help, Cerf argued. 

According to him, part of the problem is human behavior. He wishes he had an easy answer to that question, but he noted that recognizing such a problem exists is an important first step. The second step is that there are ways to protect ourselves from bad content online by using critical thinking. Where does that information come from? Is there evidence? Does anyone have the motivation to post this information online to convince someone to do something? Critical thinking helps, but it can't deal with all problems - it can't deal with malware, for example, attacks on servers. But software could be created that recognises these problems and tries to counter them, and that requires collaboration, joint action, including across borders, the laureate explained. He gave the example of the discussions at the UN Summit of the Future. This shows that countries around the world are trying to find ways to work together to tackle these problems, Cerf said. 

He believes that taking responsibility is a critical element that we need to bring to this environment. In his words, he used to think that anonymity was one of the key features of the Internet, but now he is convinced that it's important to be able to identify who is committing harmful acts because they may be in one country and their victims may be in another country, under another jurisdiction. So, this is an international problem, he noted.

However, he is adamant about the benefits of the Internet and the development of technology. He underscored that he does not regret what they did with his team. 

He continues to believe that Internet and the global computer network have created huge value added, new types of jobs, eoconomic value added, as well as have assisted in making scientific discoveries. Indeed, there is that other problem, and it cannot be ignored and has to be dealth with, Cerf added. 

Data have become an extremely important commodity in today's world, he said during the talks with journalists from across the globe within the Heidelberg Laureate Forum. Most studying computer science today are interested mainly in machine learning and the capabilities of large language models. They are truly capable of remarkable activities, but they can also "hallucinate," Cerf said. He told the story of how he asked a chatbot to write him an obituary, and the chatbot offered a text containing parts of Cert's biography along with facts that had nothing to do with him, his family, and his work. In his words, the problem with some of these AI systems is tha they sound so sure of the result of their work because they generate it from well-written texts. However, these are completely wrong.

He gave examples of AI's exceptional contribution, such as the AlphaFold programme developed by DeepMind, which generates 200 million proteins that would originate from human DNA, or weather forecast models using neuron networks or large language models.

Cerf said that the 11th Heidelberg Laureate Forum already has several laureates who were once participants as students. Eleven years later, the result is already clear to see, he noted. For yet another year, the students and young scientists in Heidelberg are filled with energy, questions, they challenge each other as well as the laureates. He considers that a privilege. In his words, he has been working at Google for 19 years now, and when young people come and ask him why don't they solve a certain task in a certain manner, his response is that they tried that solution 25 years ago without success. Then he remembers why they failed 25 years ago. Computers of today are faster, cheaper, with bigger memory and smaller energy consumption. That is why today they go back to some tasks that they failed to solve back in the day, Cerf explained.

Cerf said that the lesson he has learned from the fast development of technology, such as smartphones, is that people should want to learn new things, otherwise they will become ever more inadequate for their time. That is why he is still working at Google. Smiling, he added that his main goal is to become the oldest employee at Google, but they would never tell him that because it is considered personal information.