1,720,965 research outputs found
Making AI work for everyone: join the global conversation
Full text linkThe United Nations Artificial Intelligence Advisory Body has asked for feedback on its report, Governing AI for Humanity. Recently, many experts in artificial intelligence have been arguing in public about how powerful AI could become, and when. Even seasoned observers have been surprised by how widely their opinions have diverged. However, nearly all experts agree that, in time, applications of AI will impact most industry sectors and areas of life, with many potential benefits and harms. Antonio Guterres, Secretary-General of the United Nations made this one of the central themes of his recent speech to the World Economic Forum in Davos. “We need governments urgently to work with tech companies on risk management frameworks for current AI development; and on monitoring and mitigating future harms. And we need a systematic effort to increase access to AI so that developing economies can benefit from its enormous potential. We need to bridge the digital divide instead of deepening it.” If AI is going to affect all of, this isn’t just a matter for governments and tech companies. Governing AI is everyone’s business. So there are good reasons for everyone to become better informed, and take part in the debates. You can support and take part in this action right now by reading and responding to the recent report by the United Nations Artificial Intelligence Advisory Body, which came out just before Christmas. I will explain the background and purpose of this work, the process, and why you might want to contribute to it, using some of the key statements in the report
Large Language Models: Prediction, pollution and projection
Full text linkTechnology stock prices have been volatile in recent months. There is a range of views about how and when major technology companies could recoup dividends from the very large investments they have made in Large Language Models (LLMs). LLMs are generative AI models. They are trained on large volumes of textual data, including from the open internet, to generate credible new text in response to questions and other prompts. Other generative AI models do something similar with pictures, sound and video. LLMs started receiving increased attention and investment after OpenAI released ChatGPT to the public in late 2022. General users were able to play with it, and, importantly, use it immediately for their own purposes. Its capabilities were easy to appreciate. Print journalists (and authors of opinion pieces) acknowledged with horrified fascination the labour-saving and careerthreatening implications for them of a technology that creates a draft of an article in seconds
After the Summit: progress in public policy on AI
Full text linkThe UK’s international Artificial Intelligence Safety Summit has answered some questions and sparked new ones. This is a good moment to reflect on what it delivered, what it didn’t cover, and how to influence development of AI in the future, in the interests of societies globally. First, it’s great to be able to report that the Summit was in many ways a success, indeed more of a success than many people thought it could be. It was arranged and delivered fast. It had to manage difficult questions about the scope and the invitee list. There were good reasons to fear that it might not be more than a superficial, passing event. It is greatly to the credit of the organisers that it became more than that. The Summit could also easily have been submerged among other recent developments, because there have been enough of those. The last month has been busy for AI and AI policy, even in the context of a packed year so far. Immediately before the summit, the United Nations announced a new high-level advisory council on AI, and I’m proud to say that they invited me to be a member. And then two days before the Summit, the White House issued President Biden’s Executive Order on Safe, Secure, and Trustworthy Artificial Intelligence. The order “establishes new standards for AI safety and security, protects Americans’ privacy, advances equity and civil rights, stands up for consumers and workers, promotes innovation and competition, advances American leadership around the world, and more.” The Executive order sets out expansive, complex and diverse ambitions for AI in the USA, including on equity, civil rights and impacts on workers. It is a major step forward. The EU AI Act has been the subject of very heated debate within and between EU institutions. It has now passed, though the nature of recent debates shows how difficult it is for legislation to keep up with technology developments. The US had previously made much less ground in comparison on proposals for government action and legislation on AI. That has now changed, and in the UK we will need to track how those ambitions are taken forward in practice, and how potential conflicts between economic and social aspirations are managed
Government policy on AI: what should the next administration focus on?
Full text linkPublic policy relating to digital technology is not one of the main political battlegrounds in the approaching general election, but the next administration will need to make decisions on it. It is possible for governments to avoid addressing these questions, but that is getting harder because changes caused by the development and uptake of digital technologies are increasingly relevant to the public and businesses, and across the economy. New policy challenges can emerge faster than they tended to in the past. Artificial intelligence has matured as a field of public policy. Far more resources are being devoted to developing and delivering policy on it than was the case several years ago. The government launched a new institute and hosted an international summit on AI safety in November, which has initiated an ongoing series of events. More recently it launched an incubator for public sector AI
Can the internet be designed to protect democracy and human rights?
Full text linkThe internet has given rise to many new opportunities and challenges for the functioning of democracy. This paper suggests that early optimism that the internet would be innately democratic in its effects was replaced over time by the recognition of a wider range of positive and negative effects and potential. It notes that this more mature and pragmatic consensus nevertheless values the internet as a vital support to democracy, and even as a human right. The paper notes that the continual emergence of new technologies, most recently generative artificial intelligence, will generate new opportunities and challenges in the future.While attention is paid to emerging threats, more support for exploring the emerging benefits of the new technologies to democracy would also deliver positives. The paper’s conclusions identify lessons from the use of deliberation tools in the broader context of the continued interactions between the internet and democracy, suggesting that democratic activity online could benefit from integrating expertise in democratic discourse into design, and by incentivising investment in and reward for deliberative use of online platforms
Democracy online: technologies for democratic deliberation
Full text linkThis paper explores the use of online tools to improve democratic participation and deliberation. These tools offer new opportunities for inclusive communication and networking, specifically targeting the participation of diverse groups in decision-making processes. It summarises recent research and published reports by users of these tools and categorises the tools according to functions and objectives. It also draws on testimony and experiences recorded in interviews with some users of these tools in public sector and civil society organisations internationally.The objective is to introduce online deliberation tools to a wider audience, including benefits, limitations and potential disadvantages, in the immediate context of research on democratic deliberation. We identify limitations of tools and of the context and markets in which online deliberation tools are currently being developed. The paper suggests that fostering a collaborative approach among technology developers and democratic practitioners, might improve opportunities for funding and continual optimisation that have been used successfully in other online application sectors
Can artificial intelligence be used to undermine elections?
Full text linkThe UK and the US are both heading towards national elections. In the next couple of years almost every major democracy will also hold the most important national elections in their systems. Previous elections in the UK and the US and a referendum in the UK saw spikes in political disinformation online, as well as online exercises in profiling and targeting for the purpose of political influencing. Similar activities have been identified around elections worldwide.The online influencing that happens around these coming elections will not simply be repeats of what we have seen before. Since the last US and UK general elections, artificial intelligence has continued to develop fast. New applications including large language models have been developed, and some have become widely available. It is very likely that some of these new tools will be used in attempts to influence the functioning and the outcomes of those elections. Some of those uses may fall within the range of safe and legitimate political activity. Others may be harmful and even dangerous to democratic processes.Collectively, we should improve our understanding of what could go wrong and how we should be protected from new harms, before the elections take place.<br/
Just outcomes: how can AI make people's lives better?
No full textThis report is the output of a series of four workshops in summer and autumn 2024 delivered by the Bennett Institute for Public Policy and the Web Science Institute and funded by the Nuffield Foundation with input from the Ada Lovelace Institute. The workshops brought people together from across disciplines and practices to discuss how artificial intelligence (AI) can work in society for the common good and, in pursuit of that objective, to find gaps in the research agenda informed by policy needs. The report summarises discussions about applying AI for the public good across four thematic areas – administrative justice, place, public health and market failure - and presents the observations, ideas and research questions generated in the workshops
Web3: the promise & the reality
No full textThis paper provides a current overview of the functions of Web3 technologies, the major application areas and the kinds of challenge the technologies are intended to resolve. It considers how these approaches are presented in relation to previous waves of the development of the internet. It also contains definitions of terms used by the industry. Views expressed about Web3 can be highly polarised, which is intriguing. Commentary about developments in computer software does not usually include the kind of extreme judgements, positive and negative, that characterise discussion of Web3. This paper explores the great divergence in perspectives. It summarises challenges and criticisms, notes significant recent developments, and suggests themes likely to be critical to the future of Web3
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