I think well have very capable, very general systems in the next few years, Demis Hassabis, CEO of DeepMind, a subsidiary of Google parent Alphabet, said Tuesday during a conference hosted by the Wall Street Journal. 

The progress in the last few years has been pretty incredible, he continued. I dont see any reason why that progress is going to slow down. I think it may even accelerate. So I think we could be just a few years, maybe within a decade away.

A.I. has been the exception to the tech sectors downturn over the past year, with companies and venture capital firms doubling down on the technology. Much of that money is flowing to develop generative A.I., algorithms that can generate text or images based on specific prompts.  

Yet research, which looks even further ahead, is already moving on from generative A.I. to AGI, according to 56% of computer scientists and A.I. researchers polled for a Stanford University survey last month. AGI would be significantly more sophisticated because it would be aware of what it says and does. Theoretically, it would be far less likely to spit out the inaccuracies and confused statements that tarnish the image of the current technology, which relies on large amounts of training data and predictive models to help it anticipate the most likely answer to what its asked to do. 

DeepMind, which was acquired by Google in 2014, made headlines in 2021 when it publicized the results of its A.I. system, called AlphaFold, that predicted the structure of every known protein in the human genome. The milestone has huge implications for disease and medicinal research. And last year, the company made headlines again by analyzing the structure of almost every protein known to science, releasing over 200 million predictions in a free-to-access database. DeepMind has also developed A.I. that is capable of diagnosing complex eye diseases, systems that cut its parent companys energy bills by 40%, and software that turns text into speech. 

Last month, Google announced it was integrating its core A.I. research team with DeepMind and appointing Hassabis as the combined units CEO to accelerate the companys push towards AGI. Google and Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai said in a statement that the overhaul would help power the next generation of our products and services.

Fast-tracked AGI development is not without its critics, however. Around 58% of A.I. experts called AGI an important concern in the Stanford survey, with 36% saying it could lead to a nuclear-level catastrophe. Some experts said AGI could represent a technological singularity, a hypothetical future moment when machines irreversibly surpass human abilities and could pose a threat to civilization.

Over 1,000 technologists and A.I. experts including Elon Musk and Apple cofounder Steve Wozniak signed an open letter in March calling for a six-month halt on advanced A.I. development to reprioritize ethics research.  One of the signatories concerns was dangers from unrestrained superhuman A.I. 

Other observers have argued that advanced A.I. could cause severe damage to society if it is not reined in and aligned with human values. Paul Christiano, an A.I. researcher who formerly led safety and alignment work at OpenAI, cautioned last week that unchecked AGI development could lead to a full-blown A.I. takeover scenario that destroys humanity. Yuval Harari, author of the popular science book Sapiens and one of the open letters signatories, also wrote in The Economist last week that A.I. was akin to a poorly understood alien intelligence, here on Earth that could represent the end of democracy if used unethically.

Speaking on stage Tuesday, Hassabis promised DeepMinds work on AGI wont put civilization at risk any time soon, as the companys current priority is to integrate A.I. with more products, which he predicted would be as game-changing as the first iPhone. 

Hassabis also said Google would responsibly develop AGI, and asserted his view that the technology be used in a cautious manner using the scientific method where you try and do very careful controlled experiments to understand what the underlying system does.

Nathaniel Chastain, who worked for OpenSea, was found guilty of wire fraud and money laundering by a jury in federal court in Manhattan Wednesday following a week-long trial and two days of deliberations.

Unlike most traditional insider-trading cases, which are centered around securities-fraud charges for misappropriating non-public information such as unreleased earnings reports, Chastain was charged with wire fraud. That allowed prosecutors to skirt the issue of whether non-fungible tokens are legally classified as a security, a hotly debated topic in the world of digital assets. 

The verdict is likely to encourage further use of the strategy by prosecutors as a tool to ferret out fraud in nontraditional markets while regulations for digital assets are still being crafted.

Chastain, 32, was responsible for selecting which NFTs would be highlighted on OpenSeas home page, which usually led to an immediate spike in the price of the assets. 

Prosecutors said that while OpenSea would keep the identity of featured tokens secret until they appeared on its home page, Chastain bought dozens of them beforehand and then sold them immediately afterward for as much as five times the purchase price, violating his duty to keep the information confidential.

The government alleged Chastain made more than $57,000 in profit from the scheme based on the value of ethereum tokens he collected from the NFT sales. Chastain argues that he never converted the proceeds to dollars and therefore never realized any gain. At Wednesdays trading price at 4:45 pm, the 19 ethereum Chastain allegedly told his girlfriend he made off the sales would be worth about $35,000.

Chastain was asked to resign in September 2021 after the community began questioning whether he was front-running sales and the company instituted policies barring employees from buying or selling featured NFTs while they were being highlighted on the home page. He was arrested in June 2022.

He faces as much as 20 years in prison on each count for his conviction, though hes likely to get far less than that. Sentencing is set for Aug. 22.

Chastain had argued NFTs arent securities or commodities and therefore arent subject to the governments theory and that what he took isnt misappropriated property, as required by the law, because it had no economic or market value. He also contended that he didnt commit money laundering because the transactions were made on a public blockchain.

A group of more than 300 defense attorneys filed a letter in support of Chastains request to throw out the indictment, saying that a finding that confidential business information is property would expand how fraud is prosecuted and and criminalize a broad swath of conduct.

The government used a similar approach in the first insider-trading case involving cryptocurrency. Ishan Wahi, a former Coinbase Global Inc. manager, pleaded guilty in February to two counts of conspiracy to commit wire fraud for trading on confidential information he learned about when the exchange was going to list new tokens.

Wahi faces as long as 20 years in prison on each count when hes sentenced later this month, although he agreed to federal guidelines that call for him to serve 36 to 47 months behind bars as part of his plea deal.

Wahi who is being represented by Chastains lawyer, David Miller has asked the court to sentence him to 10 months or less in prison, saying he is a man of outstanding character who crossed the line.

Ishans name has been associated with the events of this case, and he will forever be a Google search away from being known as the first insider to be convicted in a cryptocurrency insider trading case, Miller wrote in an April 26 memo to the court.