DeepMind co-founder meets Lee Sedol again after ten years of "War between Man and Machine"

Google DeepMind co-founder Demis Hassabis reunited with legendary Korean Go player Lee Sedol on Wednesday. Ten years ago, Lee Sedol engaged in a world-famous "human-machine war" with Google's artificial intelligence program AlphaGo.

"It's great to be back here, back where it all started," Hassabis said at a Google event in downtown Seoul, noting that the historic five-game game "marked the beginning of the amazing progress in artificial intelligence over the past decade."

When asked about the match between Lee Sedol and AlphaGo in 2016, the Google executive pointed out that AlphaGo's 37th move was "the most incredible moment" and demonstrated the creativity of artificial intelligence.

In the second game of the 2016 competition, AlphaGo made an unconventional "five-way shoulder rush" in the 37th move. This move was widely considered to be the key to victory, and ultimately helped it defeat Lee Sedol.

Hassabis said that this kind of creativity of artificial intelligence can lead mankind to usher in a new "renaissance" in the field of science, just as it helped him solve the "protein folding problem" that has troubled him for 50 years, and this problem eventually won him the 2024 Nobel Prize in Chemistry.

"I think we may even be able to conquer all diseases in the next 10 to 20 years. We can use these technologies to improve the environment and develop new energy sources," he said.

The "Father of AlphaGo" also mentioned South Korea's potential to become a leader in the field of artificial intelligence.

"South Korea has performed well in manufacturing chips to robots, and has strong industrial strength, first-class universities and research institutions," he said. "So I think South Korea has all the conditions to become a world leader in artificial intelligence technology."

Hassabis began his visit to South Korea on Monday, meeting with South Korean President Lee Jae-myung and signing a memorandum of understanding on a technical cooperation program with South Korea's Ministry of Science and Technology.

The executive also met with heads of local Korean business groups including LG Group and Hyundai Motor Group.