by Ann Armbrecht, SHI Founder and Director
I recently attended my daughter’s graduation from the Kennedy School of Government. In his commencement speech, Jeremy Weinstein, the Dean of the School, said that whether and how we take control of our technological future will define their future in public leadership. I am sharing these key points from his talk because he highlights so clearly why it is critical that we all engage in conversations about the governance of AI. Not after we use AI but before and alongside our use of it.
SHI will be hosting Jane Franch to speak about these issues at the June SHI Member Meeting so that we can do exactly what Dean Weinstein called on the audience to do: take our responsiblity as companies using these tools seriously and engage in conversations about their governance.
Sometimes inefficiency is the point
Weinstein began by speaking about the benefits of AI, demonstrated and promised, and how, in the world of algorithms, optimization is a value. While efficiency is valuable in coding, he explained, “optimization becomes a risk when it is adopted as a world view… Not everything is coding,” he said. When you think about what make life fulfilling, you encounter things that can’t be reduced to o’s and I’s. There are things we can’t measure. Things like love, like how we care for our children.
He had them look around the audience and think about what got them there. “There is nothing technological about this. No short cuts. No query you can send to AI to create that kind of love. Just hard earned human connection…. love forged through long hours of connection…. And love like that will always be the best thing in the world.”
These will always be the most important things, he continued, and they don’t have efficient solutions. “Relationships are supposed to be complex. They are sometimes hard. That’s what makes them worthwhile.”
As with relationships, democracy is complex. It doesn’t lend itself to optimization. “Sometimes democracy is inefficient and sometimes isn’t inefficiency is the point,” he said.
Some (but not all) of the questions to ask
He continued by saying that we can’t let the powerful actors of technology or any powerful actors make decisions about the use of these technologies that will shape our future. “Discovering how these technologies will impact our future is on us.” We need to consider questions such as:
- What responsibilities do companies have for the wellbeing of their employees?
- How do we ensure that the benefits are broadly distributed and the risks are shared?
- Do we need an international agreement on the deployment of AI similar to those forged during the nuclear age?
- And many, many more, he said.
“Even if you don’t feel you have a personal stake in the future of this technology, your stake in democracy itself requires that you take this debate both seriously and personally.”
“We have to take this risk seriously. Technology will reshape our world,” he said. “We can’t let decisions about how that is managed happen in a vacuum. And we have to take an active role in leading…. Do not let this moment happen to you or to us.”
Skills for leading
He then explained why they were uniquely qualified for this.
- They are the last generation to be educated before AI. This gives them a huge advantage. “They were educated before it’s availability threatened to undermine critical thinking skills and cognitive capabilities. They are the products of an education system that used time tested strategies like reading, writing, talking with other people in person, strategies that instilled empathy, creativity, collaboration, truth seeking, and judgement… You have a sense of what is at stake and the risk of cognitive offloading.”
- They understand the value of policy and how the rule of law underlies the market. They understand how a strong regulatory environment solves what the bottom line won’t. The government has an ability to balance perspectives and solve for problems as whole.
- They know how to sit in the muck. They have been trained not to optimize, but to understand there is not a right answer. They know how to do the work of building across differences and finding a shared way forward.
He closed by saying there are tremendous opportunities from technology.
“But if we fail to wrestle with these questions, if we let our technological future be determined by those who only think in terms of could and not should, then we as a society will be left to hope that the giant lizard is peaceful. There is a lot at stake in how we handle this.”