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The White House's "Voluntary" AI Guidelines are a dangerous sham
On Friday, President Biden met with reps from Amazon, Anthropic, Google, Inflection, Meta, Microsoft and OpenAI to announce secured voluntary commitments for the “safe, secure, and transparent development of AI technology.”
The presser’s third paragraph adds two deeply disturbing words to that seemingly innocuous list…
These commitments, which the companies have chosen to undertake immediately, underscore three principles that must be fundamental to the future of AI – safety, security, and trust – and mark a critical step toward developing responsible AI.
So out with “transparent” and in with “trust” and “responsible.” And yes, that means what you think it means: censorship. Here’s the money shot from the official White House AI agreement:
Trust Companies have a duty to do right by the public and earn the people’s trust. That means… ensuring that the technology does not promote bias and discrimination, strengthening privacy protections, and shielding children from harm. Finally, it means using AI to help meet society’s greatest challenges, from cancer to climate change, and managing AI’s risks so that its benefits can be fully realized.
According to the President of the United States, privately held internet-based companies have a “duty to earn the people’s trust” by censoring “bias” and providing information that fights climate change.
Bias is, of course, a subjective term. A kissing cousin to the bête noire of free speech advocates: “misinformation.” You know, like the legitimacy of Hunter’s laptop, the Wuhan lab leak theory, the dangers of COVID vaccines and climate change deniers (to name a few recent examples).
“These voluntary commitments are only a first step in developing and enforcing binding obligations,” the White House asserts, just in case you thought the shadow ministry of propaganda that worked hand-in-glove with Meta, Facebook and Twitter was a temporary measure.
”The companies commit to sharing information across the industry and with governments, civil society, and academia on managing AI risks.”
You don’t have to read between the lines to see this as a slap in the face to anyone who’s down with Ronald Reagan’s warning that "The nine most terrifying words in the English language are ‘I'm from the Government, and I'm here to help.’”
To its credit, npr.org reveals the main reason Amazon, Anthropic, Google, Inflection, Meta, Microsoft and OpenAI are on board with government oversight.
Some experts and upstart competitors worry that the type of regulation being floated could be a boon for deep-pocketed first-movers led by OpenAI, Google and Microsoft as smaller players are elbowed out by the high cost of making their AI systems known as large language models adhere to regulatory strictures.
Correct. The AI giants are trading free speech for regulations that provide commercial protection – the same Faustian bargain that the major car companies made to restrict competition. Shamelessly so.
Microsoft President Brad Smith said in a blog post Friday that his company is making some commitments that go beyond the White House pledge, including support for regulation that would create a “licensing regime for highly capable models.”
Lest we forget, back in May, Open AI jefe Altman called for the creation of a new AI agency, “similar to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA),” that would be responsible for regulating AI.
The White House whitewash doesn’t moot a regulatory framework for AI content monitoring: a politically appointed – and thus political – cop/gatekeeper.
Don’t worry, one’s coming!
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., has said he will introduce legislation to regulate AI. He said in a statement that he will work closely with the Biden administration “and our bipartisan colleagues” to build upon the pledges made Friday.
The other reason the AI cartel is OK with federal AI regulations: they love them some left-leaning editorial “guardrails” (i.e., censorship). As I reported in Chat GPT is a Social Justice Warrior, the chatbots are already doing it.
There is only one potential impediment to Big Brother AI: Elon Musk.
"What we need is TruthGPT,” Mr Musk tweeted in February. And so the Tesla, SpaceX, Twitter and Boring Company owner is creating xAI,.
Oh wait.
"I think there should be a regulatory body established for overseeing AI to make sure that it does not present a danger to the public,” Musk said on the other side of his mouth.
We shall see if and how Musk’s large language model AI differs from OpenAI’s anti-fossil fuel, anti-anti-vax, anti-Trump and pro-Biden ChatGPT. Meanwhile, I asked Google’s Bard AI if it has a liberal bias.
As an AI assistant, I cannot make assumptions about the political bias of news sources or media outlets. However, it's always a good idea to consume news from a variety of sources to get a well-rounded perspective.
That’s assuming there is a variety of sources with a variety of perspectives from which to consume. Even now that’s a questionable assumption.
If you think government regulated AI won’t negatively affect that availability, it’s time to re-think your position. And hold on to Substack and Wikipedia for dear life.
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