ANALYSIS – Artificial Intelligence (AI) is basically self-learning software (algorithms) that grows smarter over time using the entire world’s ever-growing library of data as its teacher. It can learn to do myriad complex tasks in a fraction of the time humans could.
It will revolutionize and upend entire economies, and dominate future warfare. It is also developing at an unprecedented rate.
Many are concerned AI will take away entire career fields and tens of millions of American jobs. AI advancements could eliminate up to 300 million jobs globally, according to Goldman Sachs.
Fox News reported: “Up to 30% of hours currently worked across the U.S. economy could become automated by 2030, creating the possibility of around 12 million occupational transitions in the coming years, according to a McKinsey Global Institute study.”
Others worry that it will make a few corporations extremely rich and powerful.
And then, many worry that Al may supersede human intelligence in just a few years and eventually make humans redundant.
Few would deny that whoever dominates AI may dominate the world. China certainly believes this and is forging ahead to become the world leader in AI.
The Pentagon is also looking closely at how it can use AI to more quickly make strategic or battlefield assessments and technologically leapfrog over our enemies.
But what about our government? Should it regulate AI?
Democrats tend to favor regulating everything. And they have shown the danger of doing so with social media. I recently wrote on how Joe Biden is already using executive power to weaponize Artificial Intelligence to be woke.
I noted that: “The American Accountability Foundation (AAF), a government watchdog group, recently warned that Team Biden is actively using the federal government’s vast power to regulate AI to promote a “woke” ideology in the basic architecture of this revolutionary, powerful, and dangerous new technology.”
“That ‘woke’ ideology promotes affirmative action under the guise of ‘anti-racism,’ and transgenderism as gender ‘equity.’”
And that is a huge concern.
Republicans tend to be more skeptical of regulation in general, especially in a dynamic, fast-moving technology that few lawmakers understand.
“Let a bunch of guys up here that are wearing JCPenney leisure suits that still have 8-track tape players in their ’72 Vegas start talking about technology, then you got some problems,” Rep. Tim Burchett, R-Tenn., told Fox News when asked about regulation keeping pace with the AI sector.
“The problem with AI is that it’s advancing so fast,” Republican Rep. Nancy Mace of South Carolina said. “It’s very difficult to regulate because you don’t know what the next thing is going to be.”
Republicans, like Burchett and Mace, also worry government regulation will stifle AI innovation and put the U.S. at a strategic disadvantage, especially vis a vis China.
“I don’t know that we need regulation,” Burchett said. “You want to stifle growth; you start putting laws on it.”
“If you overregulate, like the government often does, you stifle innovation,” Mace told Fox News. “And if we just stop AI, nothing is stopping China. We want to make sure that we are No. 1 in AI technology in the world and that it stays that way.”
But we may be losing that race. As Time reported:
“The country that is able to most rapidly and effectively integrate new technology into war-fighting wins,” Alexandr Wang, the CEO of Scale AI, told lawmakers on a House Armed Services subcommittee. China is spending three times more than the U.S. on developing AI tools, Wang noted. “The Chinese Communist Party deeply understands the potential for AI to disrupt warfare, and is investing heavily to capitalize,” he said. “AI is China’s Apollo project.”
But Republicans in Congress aren’t doing anything to take away Biden’s power to regulate AI himself. And time is of the essence.
As a former Democrat Senator, Kent Conrad, and ex-Republican Senator Saxby Chambliss wrote recently in Fox News:
This comes at a pivotal moment. We are on the precipice of a new tech revolution—one in which a collection of next-generation capabilities—such as AI, quantum computing, and biotechnology—promise to fundamentally upend every facet of society.
Opinions expressed by contributors do not necessarily reflect the views of Great America News Desk.
