Both local policymakers like the DC city council and federal policymakers like the Federal Trade Commission are proposing to turn their concerns into policies that could severely limit the use of newer technology, known as artificial intelligence (AI). This has happened time and again, with everything from the telephone to the internet. However, our fears could hold us back from the very real benefits of the AI tool.
Some policymakers are quick to react to new technologies with proposed regulations to “protect” their fellow citizens. This is typically done with the assumption that more regulation is always the answer to these fears. And the concept of AI in particular may conjure up dystopian ideas like the pre-crimes in Minority Report or Skynet in the Terminator movies. However, not only is it a very beneficial, benign technology that already improves our lives, but AI is far easier to respond to and reprogram than to reform the implicit bias that may exist in a human being.
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