We are AI.” That Borg-esque greeting may soon come to the Internet in the form of new AI overlords. In a recent chilling interview, Microsoft founder and billionaire Bill Gates called for the use of artificial intelligence to fight not only “digital disinformation” but also “political polarization.”
He is just the latest to call for the use of artificial intelligence or algorithms to shape what people say or read online. The danger of such a system is obvious where freedom of speech, as well as resistance, could become meaningless.
In an interview with the German show “Handelsblatt Disrupt”, Gates calls for the release of artificial intelligence to prevent certain opinions from being “magnified by digital channels”. The problem is that we allow “people who want to believe these things to spread conspiracy theories like QAnon or whatever.”
This is not the first call to the masters of artificial intelligence to protect us from ourselves. Last September, Gates delivered a keynote speech at the Forbes 400 Summit on Philanthropy. He told his fellow billionaires that “polarization and lack of trust are the problem”.
The problem is again… well… people: “People look for easy solutions, and the truth is sometimes pretty boring.”
Not AI, of course. That would provide solutions. Otherwise, Gates argued, we could all die: “Political polarization could mean the end, we’ll have an election battle and a civil war.”
Others proposed a Brave New World in which citizens are carefully guided in what they read and see. Democratic leaders have called for some sort of “enlightened algorithms” to determine what citizens watch online. In 2021, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) spoke out against people who do not listen to the informed views of herself and leading experts. Instead, they read skeptical opinions by searching Amazon and finding books by “prominent disinformation purveyors”.
Warren criticized Amazon for not limiting searches or choices: “This pattern and practice of misconduct suggests that Amazon is unwilling or unable to modify its business practices to prevent the spread of falsehoods or the sale of inappropriate products.” In her letter, Warren gave the company 14 days to change its algorithms to stifle and prevent attempts to read dissenting opinions.
Social media responded to such calls and turned to widespread censorship of those who held opposing views on mask obligations, vaccine safety, school obligations and the origins of COVID-19. Many of these criticisms and viewpoints are now recognized as persuasive and legitimate, but scientists are banned and censored. No “polarization” was allowed. The public was never allowed this full discussion on social media, as such views were labeled as misinformation.
President Biden joined these calls for censorship, often sounding like the censor-in-chief, accusing social media of “killing people” by not blocking enough. He recently questioned whether the public could “know the truth” without such censorship by “editors” at Big Tech.
They found an eager corps of censors in companies like Twitter. After taking over as CEO, Parag Agrawal promised to regulate content as a “reflection of the things we believe lead to a healthier public conversation”. Agrawal said the company will “focus less on free speech thinking” because “speech is easy on the Internet. Most people can speak. Where our role is particularly emphasized is who and what can be heard.”
That point was made last week at the first hearing on Twitter’s censorship program. Former Twitter CEO Anika Collier Navaroli testified repeatedly about what she called the “nuanced” standard she and her colleagues used in censorship. She explained that they weren’t just weighing free speech against public safety when deciding whether someone should speak. Censorship depends on the people involved: “Whose freedom of speech are we protecting at the expense of whose safety and whose safety are we willing to let go so that people can speak freely?”
All of this would be much easier with an AI Overlord that can protect us from our own doubts and divisions. Currently, Microsoft, the company Gates founded, uses NewsGuard, a self-proclaimed arbiter of disinformation, which screens sites and has been widely criticized for targeting conservative media.
Now this job could be handed over to the master of artificial intelligence. Of course, intelligence remains artificial. Man has to program what is true and what is unbearable “polarization”. It would be an improved version of ChatGPT, the popular AI service that Microsoft recently incorporated into its Bing search engine. It censors “offensive” content and blocks certain views because it is instructed to do so.
Artificial intelligence forces the collective truth to be expanded for the greater good, as defined by figures like Gates.
Obviously we’re not dealing with a giant menacing cube orbiting our planet (no, Chinese balloons don’t count). Still, after years of censorship, you’d be forgiven if it all sounded eerily like “Put down your shields and surrender… Resistance is futile.”
