China Plays the Long Game in AI While US Chases Superintelligence: Brookings
The U.S. and China are pursuing different strategies in the global AI landscape. While the U.S. focuses on achieving artificial general intelligence (AGI) and invests heavily in massive data centers, Chinese companies prioritize efficiency, widespread adoption, and rapid integration of AI into real-world systems and devices. China advances by improving model efficiency, leveraging open-source models, and embedding AI in products like vehicles, smartphones, and robotics, emphasizing practical deployment over breakthroughs in superintelligence. This approach allows for broader distribution of AI across industries and society. Open-source models pose security concerns, as they may be accessed by militaries, including China’s. There are also questions about the role of model distillation, where AI models are trained using outputs from more advanced systems, sometimes through unauthorized "distillation attacks." These differing priorities could enable international cooperation or agreements to limit certain types of AI development in the future.
