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You lost me at "While AI regulation is important" - nope, congress does not need to regulate AI.

by kubota 3y ago

laratied 3y ago
If if someone doesn't agree with this, regulate what exactly? Does scikit-learn count or we are just not going to bother defining what we mean by "AI"? "AI" is whatever congress says it is? That is an absolutely terrible idea.
silveraxe93 3y ago
They might have lost you. But starting with "congress shouldn't regulate AI" would lose the senator. Which one do you think is more important to convince?
- polski-g 3y ago
  "Congress cannot regulate AI" https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2015/04/remembering-case-established-code-speech https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2015/04/remembering-case-estab...
tessierashpool 3y ago
"important" does not mean "good." if you are in the field of AI, AI regulation is absolutely important, whether good or bad.
wnevets 3y ago
> nope, congress does not need to regulate AI. Not regulating the air quality we breathe for decades turned out amazing for millions of the Americas. Yes, lets do the same with AI! What could possibility go wrong?
- pizza 3y ago
  I think this is a great argument in the opposite direction.. atoms matter, information isn’t. A small group of people subjugated many others to poisonous matter. That matter affected their bodies and a causal link could be made. Even if you really believe that somewhere in the chain of consequences derived from LLMs there could be grave and material damage or other affronts to human dignity, there is almost always a more direct causal link that acts as the thing which makes that damage kinetic and physical. And that’s the proper locus for regulation. Otherwise this is all just a bit reminiscent of banning numbers and research into numbers. Want to protect people’s employment? Just do that! Enshrine it in law. Want to improve the safety of critical infrastructure and make sure they’re reliable? Again, just do that! Want to prevent mass surveillance? Do that! Want to protect against a lack of oversight in complex systems allowing for subterfuge via bad actors? Well, make regulation about proper standards of oversight and human accountability. AI doesn’t obviate human responsibility, and a lack of responsibility on the part of humans who should’ve been responsible, and who instead cut corners, doesn’t mean that the blame falls on the tool that cut the corners, but rather the corner-cutters themselves.
  - ptsneves 3y ago
    You ended up providing examples that have no matter or atoms: protecting jobs, or oversight of complex systems. These are policies which are a purely imaginary. Only when they get implemented into human law do they get a grain of substance but still imaginary. Failure to comply can be kinetic but that is a contingency not the object (matter :D). Personally I find good ideas on having regulations on privacy, intelectual property, filming people on my house’s bathroom, NDAs etc. These subjects are central to the way society works today. At least western society would be severely affected if these subjects were suddenly a free for all. I am not convinced we need such regulation for Ai at this point of technology readiness but if social implications create unacceptable unbalances we can start by regulating in detail. If detailed caveats still do not work then broader law can come. Which leads to my own theory: All this turbulence about regulation reflects a mismatch between technological, politic and legal knowledge. Tech people don’t know law nor how it flows from policy. Politicians do not know the tech and have not seen its impacts on society. Naturally there is a pressure gradient from both sides that generates turbulence. The pressure gradient is high because the stakes are high: for techs the killing of a new forthcoming field; for politicians because they do not want a big majority of their constituency rendered useless. Final point: if one sees AI as a means of production which can be monopolised by few capital rich we may see a 19th century inequality remake. It created one of the most powerful ideologies know: Communism.
    - mLuby 3y ago
      Ironically communism would've had a better chance of success if it had AI for the centrally planned economy and social controls. Hardcore materialism will play into automation's hands though. We're more likely to see a theocratic movement centered on the struggle of human souls vs the soulless simulacra of AI.
      - ptsneves 3y ago
        > Ironically communism would've had a better chance of success if it had AI for the centrally planned economy and social controls. Hardcore materialism will play into automation's hands though. Exactly! A friend of mine who is into the communist ideology thinks that whichever society taps AI for productivity efficiency, and even policy, will become the new hegemon. I have no immediate counterpoint besides the technology not being there yet. I can definitely imagine LLM based on political manifests. A personal conversation with your senator at any time about any subject! That is the basic part though: The politician being augmented by the LLM. The bad part is a party, driven by a LLM or similar political model, where the human guy you see and elect is just a mouthpiece like in "The moon is a harsh mistress". Policy would all be algorithmic and the LLM out provide the interface between the fundamental processing and the mouthpiece. These conflicts will likely lead to the conflicts you mention. I am pretty sure there will be a new -ism.
haswell 3y ago
I’d argue that sweeping categorical statements like this are at the center of the problem. People are coalescing into “for” and “against” camps, which makes very little sense given the broad spectrum of technologies and problems summarized in statements like “AI regulation”. I think it’s a bit like saying “software (should|shouldn't) be regulated”. It’s a position that cannot be defended because the term software is too broad.
runarberg 3y ago
If AI is to be a consumer good—which it already is—it needs to be regulated, at the very least to ensure equal quality to a diverse set of customers and other users. Unregulated there is high risk of people being affected by e.g. employers and landlords using AI to discriminate. Or you being sold an AI solution which isn’t as advertised. If AI will be used by public institutions, especially law enforcement, we need it regulated in the same manner. A bad AI trained on biased data has the potential to be extremely dangerous in the hands of a cop who is already predisposed for racist behavior.
- candiodari 3y ago
  AI is being used as a consumer good, including to discriminate: https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/maximise-profits-facial-recognition-tool-used-to-target-high-rollers-20221025-p5bsot.html https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/maximise-profits-facial-... AI is being used by law enforcement and public institutions. In fact so much that perhaps this is a good link: https://www.monster.com/jobs/search?q=artificial+intelligence+Government&where=&page=1&so=m.s.sh https://www.monster.com/jobs/search?q=artificial+intelligenc... In both cases it's too late to do anything about it. AI is "loose". Oh and I don't know if you noticed, governments have collectively decided law doesn't apply to them, only to their citizens, and only in a negative way. For instance, just about every country has laws on the books guaranteeing timely emergency care at hospitals, with timely defined as within 1 or 2 hours. Waiting times are 8-10 hours (going up to days) and this is the normal situation now, it's not a New Year's eve or even Friday evening thing anymore. You have the "right" to less waiting time, which can only mean the government (the worst hospitals are public ones) should be forced to fix this, spending whatever it needs to to fix it. And it can be fixed, I mean at this point you'd have to give physicians and nurses a 50% rise and double the number employed and 10x the number in training. Government is just outright not doing this, and if one thing's guaranteed, this will keep getting worse, a direct violation of your rights in most states, for the next 10 years minimum, but probably longer.
  - runarberg 3y ago
    Post hoc consumer protection is actually quite common. Just think how long after cars entered the marked before they were regulated. Now we have fuel standards, led bans, seat belts, crash tests etc. Even today we are still adding consumer protection to stuff like airline travels and medicine, even though commercial airliners and laboratory made drugs have been around for almost a century.

You lost me at "While AI regulation is important" - nope, congress does not need to regulate AI.

by kubota 3y ago

You lost me at "While AI regulation is important" - nope, congress does not need to regulate AI.

If if someone doesn't agree with this, regulate what exactly? Does scikit-learn count or we are just not going to bother defining what we mean by "AI"? "AI" is whatever congress says it is? That is an absolutely terrible idea.

silveraxe93 3y ago

They might have lost you. But starting with "congress shouldn't regulate AI" would lose the senator. Which one do you think is more important to convince?

polski-g 3y ago
"Congress cannot regulate AI" https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2015/04/remembering-case-established-code-speech https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2015/04/remembering-case-estab...

tessierashpool 3y ago

"important" does not mean "good." if you are in the field of AI, AI regulation is absolutely important, whether good or bad.

wnevets 3y ago

> nope, congress does not need to regulate AI. Not regulating the air quality we breathe for decades turned out amazing for millions of the Americas. Yes, lets do the same with AI! What could possibility go wrong?

pizza 3y ago
I think this is a great argument in the opposite direction.. atoms matter, information isn’t. A small group of people subjugated many others to poisonous matter. That matter affected their bodies and a causal link could be made. Even if you really believe that somewhere in the chain of consequences derived from LLMs there could be grave and material damage or other affronts to human dignity, there is almost always a more direct causal link that acts as the thing which makes that damage kinetic and physical. And that’s the proper locus for regulation. Otherwise this is all just a bit reminiscent of banning numbers and research into numbers. Want to protect people’s employment? Just do that! Enshrine it in law. Want to improve the safety of critical infrastructure and make sure they’re reliable? Again, just do that! Want to prevent mass surveillance? Do that! Want to protect against a lack of oversight in complex systems allowing for subterfuge via bad actors? Well, make regulation about proper standards of oversight and human accountability. AI doesn’t obviate human responsibility, and a lack of responsibility on the part of humans who should’ve been responsible, and who instead cut corners, doesn’t mean that the blame falls on the tool that cut the corners, but rather the corner-cutters themselves.
- ptsneves 3y ago
  You ended up providing examples that have no matter or atoms: protecting jobs, or oversight of complex systems. These are policies which are a purely imaginary. Only when they get implemented into human law do they get a grain of substance but still imaginary. Failure to comply can be kinetic but that is a contingency not the object (matter :D). Personally I find good ideas on having regulations on privacy, intelectual property, filming people on my house’s bathroom, NDAs etc. These subjects are central to the way society works today. At least western society would be severely affected if these subjects were suddenly a free for all. I am not convinced we need such regulation for Ai at this point of technology readiness but if social implications create unacceptable unbalances we can start by regulating in detail. If detailed caveats still do not work then broader law can come. Which leads to my own theory: All this turbulence about regulation reflects a mismatch between technological, politic and legal knowledge. Tech people don’t know law nor how it flows from policy. Politicians do not know the tech and have not seen its impacts on society. Naturally there is a pressure gradient from both sides that generates turbulence. The pressure gradient is high because the stakes are high: for techs the killing of a new forthcoming field; for politicians because they do not want a big majority of their constituency rendered useless. Final point: if one sees AI as a means of production which can be monopolised by few capital rich we may see a 19th century inequality remake. It created one of the most powerful ideologies know: Communism.
  - mLuby 3y ago
    Ironically communism would've had a better chance of success if it had AI for the centrally planned economy and social controls. Hardcore materialism will play into automation's hands though. We're more likely to see a theocratic movement centered on the struggle of human souls vs the soulless simulacra of AI.
    - ptsneves 3y ago
      > Ironically communism would've had a better chance of success if it had AI for the centrally planned economy and social controls. Hardcore materialism will play into automation's hands though. Exactly! A friend of mine who is into the communist ideology thinks that whichever society taps AI for productivity efficiency, and even policy, will become the new hegemon. I have no immediate counterpoint besides the technology not being there yet. I can definitely imagine LLM based on political manifests. A personal conversation with your senator at any time about any subject! That is the basic part though: The politician being augmented by the LLM. The bad part is a party, driven by a LLM or similar political model, where the human guy you see and elect is just a mouthpiece like in "The moon is a harsh mistress". Policy would all be algorithmic and the LLM out provide the interface between the fundamental processing and the mouthpiece. These conflicts will likely lead to the conflicts you mention. I am pretty sure there will be a new -ism.

haswell 3y ago

I’d argue that sweeping categorical statements like this are at the center of the problem. People are coalescing into “for” and “against” camps, which makes very little sense given the broad spectrum of technologies and problems summarized in statements like “AI regulation”. I think it’s a bit like saying “software (should|shouldn't) be regulated”. It’s a position that cannot be defended because the term software is too broad.

runarberg 3y ago

If AI is to be a consumer good—which it already is—it needs to be regulated, at the very least to ensure equal quality to a diverse set of customers and other users. Unregulated there is high risk of people being affected by e.g. employers and landlords using AI to discriminate. Or you being sold an AI solution which isn’t as advertised. If AI will be used by public institutions, especially law enforcement, we need it regulated in the same manner. A bad AI trained on biased data has the potential to be extremely dangerous in the hands of a cop who is already predisposed for racist behavior.

candiodari 3y ago
AI is being used as a consumer good, including to discriminate: https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/maximise-profits-facial-recognition-tool-used-to-target-high-rollers-20221025-p5bsot.html https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/maximise-profits-facial-... AI is being used by law enforcement and public institutions. In fact so much that perhaps this is a good link: https://www.monster.com/jobs/search?q=artificial+intelligence+Government&where=&page=1&so=m.s.sh https://www.monster.com/jobs/search?q=artificial+intelligenc... In both cases it's too late to do anything about it. AI is "loose". Oh and I don't know if you noticed, governments have collectively decided law doesn't apply to them, only to their citizens, and only in a negative way. For instance, just about every country has laws on the books guaranteeing timely emergency care at hospitals, with timely defined as within 1 or 2 hours. Waiting times are 8-10 hours (going up to days) and this is the normal situation now, it's not a New Year's eve or even Friday evening thing anymore. You have the "right" to less waiting time, which can only mean the government (the worst hospitals are public ones) should be forced to fix this, spending whatever it needs to to fix it. And it can be fixed, I mean at this point you'd have to give physicians and nurses a 50% rise and double the number employed and 10x the number in training. Government is just outright not doing this, and if one thing's guaranteed, this will keep getting worse, a direct violation of your rights in most states, for the next 10 years minimum, but probably longer.
- runarberg 3y ago
  Post hoc consumer protection is actually quite common. Just think how long after cars entered the marked before they were regulated. Now we have fuel standards, led bans, seat belts, crash tests etc. Even today we are still adding consumer protection to stuff like airline travels and medicine, even though commercial airliners and laboratory made drugs have been around for almost a century.