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I.T. News – Sept 26, 2024

1 - Rethinking ‘Checks and Balances’ for the A.I. Age

New York Times. September 24, 2024.

In the late 1780s, shortly after the Industrial Revolution had begun, Alexander Hamilton, James Madison and John Jay wrote a series of 85 spirited essays, collectively known as the Federalist Papers. They argued for ratification of the Constitution and an American system of checks and balances to keep power-hungry “factions” in check.

A new project, orchestrated by Stanford University and published on Tuesday, is inspired by the Federalist Papers and contends that today is a broadly similar historical moment of economic and political upheaval that calls for a rethinking of society’s institutional arrangements.

In an introduction to its collection of 12 essays, called the Digitalist Papers, the editors overseeing the project, including Erik Brynjolfsson, director of the Stanford Digital Economy Lab, and Condoleezza Rice, secretary of state in the George W. Bush administration and director of the Hoover Institution, identify their overarching concern.

“A powerful new technology, artificial intelligence,” they write, “explodes onto the scene and threatens to transform, for better or worse, all legacy social institutions.”

The most common theme in the diverse collection of essays: Citizens need to be more involved in determining how to regulate and incorporate A.I. into their lives. “To build A.I. for the people, with the people,” as one essay summed it up.

The project is being published as the technology is racing ahead. A.I. enthusiasts see a future of higher economic growth, increased prosperity and a faster pace of scientific discovery. But the technology is also raising fears of a dystopian alternative — A.I. chatbots and automated software not only replacing millions of workers, but also generating limitless misinformation and worsening political polarization. How to govern and guide A.I. in the public interest remains an open question.

“Technologists are pushing the A.I. frontier, and that’s great,” said Mr. Brynjolfsson, who initiated the project. “But there’s been no comparable effort given to the institutional innovation needed for this technology to be used less to fuel misinformation and polarization, and more to empower people more broadly.”

By now, many governments, nonprofits and universities and even a few companies have recommended A.I. guidelines and guardrails, typically a list of dos and don’ts. The Stanford initiative, subtitled “Artificial Intelligence and Democracy in America,” has a different focus, not so much prescriptive solutions as different perspectives on the A.I. threats to democracy and technology’s potential to revitalize democratic decision-making.

The project’s five editors and 19 essay authors and co-authors span different disciplines and outlooks — economists, political scientists and technologists, liberals and conservatives. Two pillars of the Silicon Valley establishment were invited to contribute essays: Reid Hoffman, co-founder of LinkedIn and a venture capitalist, and Eric Schmidt, former chief executive of Google.

Support in funding and staff time for the Digitalist Papers came from Stanford and the Project Liberty Institute, a nonprofit focused on fostering a more human-centered internet.

Most of the Stanford project’s authors share a concern that the economic power of the big tech companies will increasingly result in political power. The essays also look at how to let citizens and consumers, rather than lobbyists and big tech companies, shape A.I. policy.

“The potential for democratic innovation is there, but the current political economy, shaped by moneyed interests and polarization, does not allow change,” said Lawrence Lessig, a professor at Harvard Law School.

One potential avenue to address the problem is what he calls “protected democratic deliberation” — where some issues can be debated and moved along outside the legacy political process.