How the Enlightenment Ends; The Atlantic, June 2018 Issue

Henry A. Kissinger, The Atlantic; How the Enlightenment Ends

 

"Heretofore confined to specific fields of activity, AI research now seeks to bring about a “generally intelligent” AI capable of executing tasks in multiple fields. A growing percentage of human activity will, within a measurable time period, be driven by AI algorithms. But these algorithms, being mathematical interpretations of observed data, do not explain the underlying reality that produces them. Paradoxically, as the world becomes more transparent, it will also become increasingly mysterious. What will distinguish that new world from the one we have known? How will we live in it? How will we manage AI, improve it, or at the very least prevent it from doing harm, culminating in the most ominous concern: that AI, by mastering certain competencies more rapidly and definitively than humans, could over time diminish human competence and the human condition itself as it turns it into data...

The Enlightenment started with essentially philosophical insights spread by a new technology. Our period is moving in the opposite direction. It has generated a potentially dominating technology in search of a guiding philosophy. Other countries have made AI a major national project. The United States has not yet, as a nation, systematically explored its full scope, studied its implications, or begun the process of ultimate learning. This should be given a high national priority, above all, from the point of view of relating AI to humanistic traditions.

AI developers, as inexperienced in politics and philosophy as I am in technology, should ask themselves some of the questions I have raised here in order to build answers into their engineering efforts. The U.S. government should consider a presidential commission of eminent thinkers to help develop a national vision. This much is certain: If we do not start this effort soon, before long we shall discover that we started too late."

Campus free speech is threatened. But how much?; The Washington Post, April 13, 2018

Megan McArdle, The Washington Post; Campus free speech is threatened. But how much?

[Kip Currier: A timely piece, given yesterday's Information Ethics final lecture of the term on Intellectual Freedom and Censorship.]

"At Heterodox Academy, a site devoted to ideological diversity on campus, Sean Stevens and Jonathan Haidt dive into that first question. The answer they come up with is: Yes, support for free speech really does seem to be decreasing among the current generation of college students. And presumably as a result, speech-chilling activity is increasing."

The technology industry needs a set of professional ethics; Baltimore Sun, March 8, 2018

Adil E. Shamoo. Baltimore Sun; The technology industry needs a set of professional ethics

"In a wider view, using an ethical framework in scientific enterprise disperses ethical principles throughout society; patients and consumers adopt these ethical standards and come to expect and even extend these standards to other endeavors.

But we have failed to develop an ethical framework when it comes to technology or to understand the impact new media would have on our behavior and societal relationships.

We need to examine the current landscape of ethics within the rapidly expanding technology sector. Just as scientific research has added requirements for classes in ethics in research, the tech sector must develop widespread ethical educational efforts. The lack of firm ethical principles allowed a serious disruption to our 2016 political election and is changing the brains of social media users and rapidly changing the workplace and our economy. What has become commonplace has become acceptable. Robots replace humans in jobs; testing of consumer behavior without consent is unquestioned; acceptability of facial and voice recognition is rarely challenged even though misuse and privacy issues are frightening; and vitriolic, divisive missives are the norm on social media."