Bill Gates on AI and humanity: thoughts up to April 2025
On a recent episode of Nikhil Kamath’s "WTF is" podcast, Bill Gates, one of the most influential figures in the IT industry, continued predicting the future from the viewpoint of the development of artificial intelligence and its place in the life of human beings. This time, he said the following (via MSN):
“Let's say 20 years from now, AI will have changed things enough that just this pure capitalistic framework probably won't explain much because AI both sort of white-collar work and, as blue-collar workers, the robots will get some good hands and be able to do the physical things the humans do.”
We decided to collect the thoughts of Bill Gates on the subject. Some people like him, some don’t, but pretty much every sane person admits the shrewdness of Mr. Gates’ mind, so scooping up his opinions is a good exercise, and when they all occupy a single page, the picture becomes at least a little bit clearer.
And since we are now living in the age of the rising AI, the job of fetching the excerpts was delegated to the most prominent of them. The yield was then assessed, vetted, and formatted by a human being. The list is non-exhaustive, but we aimed to cover the most important thoughts.
So, here’s Bill Gates on AI and humans
Having been asked about the future of AI, Gates was optimistic, but cautious, and said that it will take a lot of time for AI to surpass human intelligence. The most difficult task, in his opinion back then, was to learn to make judgements like people do. Still, Mr. Gates believed the problem was not unsolvable even in 2013.
One of the first times (if not the very first) that Bill Gates openly expressed concern about AI risks, seconding Elon Musk’s views to a certain degree. The road to become smarter than humans did not seem that long to Mr. Gates anymore; he stated that once AI algorithms are replicated in silicon, they could quickly surpass human intelligence, and called them a “huge challenge” that people underestimate.
Speech at World Economic Forum, 2016
Another warning from Bill Gates: AI does pose certain risks to humanity, especially if it does not share human goals, which is a distinct possibility. The situation and the respective developments should be monitored and flagged as risky business, although nothing was of immediate concern at that time.
FOX Interview at World Economic Forum, 2018
In this piece, Gates described AI as “simply better software,” expressing his excitement with machine learning’s potential in manufacturing and monitoring high-risk applications. As for the concerns related to AI taking jobs of people, he was positive new roles would appear for humans to take on, and stated that humanity can do much more than make and sell things.
Bill Gates suggested that in five years, AI will automate so much the changes in people’s lives will be of a transformative nature. He compared AI’s impact to past technological shifts that created new jobs despite initial fears, and stressed, among other things, AI’s potential to provide free and high-quality medical assistance, which is of special value for poorer countries (Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has been helping such on a large scale for a long time now).
CNBC interview and a piece in Fortune, March 2025
Another prediction, but this time stretching 10 years into the future: AI will do many tasks for humans, replacing most doctors and teachers. Within a decade, a two-day workweek will be a reality. Expert knowledge will be free and available everywhere. He called this new age “free intelligence,” but did underscore the lack of brakes on the AI train, which is continuously accelerating. Remembering the achievements of OpenAI, Bill Gates acknowledged that the real progress surpassed expectations.
