The advent of AI turns Democracy into Dictatorship

A democratic government is for the people, by the people, where their privacy is respected and secularism is maintained. In dictatorship type of government, a dictator possesses absolute power and believes in autocratic way of ruling. Privacy, secularism, equality is not a necessary talk topic here. But what if AI became a dictator like a robot? I believe suppression, repression and oppression are then foreseen. Musk believed that a dictator, even the evillest one has an end, but for AI there will be no end. It will live forever like an immortal dictator who has all the information about everyone. We all have evidence that the power of AI is increasing day by day. The start, although was harmless and beneficial. Search engines and recommendation platforms were personalizing our feed; making easier to search and make choices. Today algorithms are smart enough to make a decision of its own, it knows what to do, how to do. It knows how we think and feels with the help of data that has been fed to it for a long time. I feel people don’t realize how they are controlled in this manner. Our choices are because of this less likely to be free and predetermined by others.

Nowadays, new technology has emerged that uses sophisticated manipulation methodologies to completely change the course of action. It is called “persuasive computing”. It can easily be used to generate free content for the internet, hence increasing ambiguity and earning billions for corporations. In the world of politics under the word “nudging”, governments are trying to use personal data of its citizens to govern them, invading privacy and freedom to make free choices. One of such examples is China. Baidu, a Chinese search engine, runs deep- learning algorithms over the data collected about users to ensure some kind of social security. The concept of “Citizen score” would reveal a person completely but at the cost of democracy and privacy. Regardless of whether the user data is collected through search engines or not, criminals, terrorists and extremists have hacked many important institutions like the Pentagon, NSA etc, making us vulnerable to dangerous post effects. Apart from Elon Musk, there are other critics as well who speak the adversity of AI, good and bad both. Prof Stephen Hawking talked about this issue in an interview. He expressed fear that the development of full artificially intelligent components can bring the end of the human race by replacing them altogether. It will also learn to replicate itself like viruses, he says. On the other hand, famous American author, computer scientist and inventor compared technology with fire by saying how fire kept us warm, cooked our food and burned down houses.  He gave an example of World War II in which over 50 million people died, which was exacerbated by the power of technology at that time. AI will be good or bad, it seems that it completely depends on us. Problems are increasing with the lack of inadequate transparency and democratic control. Algorithms and recommendation systems can be influenced in the favour of those who are ready to pay in order to get favourable results, even government too. The problem with super-intelligent computers is that they cannot be stopped. Once there is a possibility of losing control of the technologies, we cannot stop it. The worse thing about it is that it will not destroy humanity if it's not in its way, which is impossible. Dr Kaku, a scientist and a futurist believe that killing robots can be persuaded by placing a chip in their brains in future if they provoke a killing or threatening thought. He said, “I think we should chip their brain to shut them off if they have murderous thoughts.”. Although, in present, robots can barely possess a brain of a cat or a dog, soon they will become as intelligent as a monkey. He said: “This may sound strange to some people, but remember that this is the people of the far future who will decide how far they want to modify themselves to deal with the super-smart robot. “Elon Musk has proposed an optimistic thought saying that once there is awareness, people will examine the threat and will be afraid. He said that they will plan some defence mechanisms but he fears it might gate late. He says that a regulatory agency must be set up to track the work of this industry. He also encourages to even take forever but plans something by-hand to eradicate such a risk to the existence of civilisation. Governments must come together and develop countermeasure against such future malicious happenings

Concluding, and keeping all that has been said, all the prophecy about AI going wrong, turning to dictatorship depends all on how one is using it. The data is abundant. In 2060, the data we have will be doubled with the doubling of the population on earth. Centralized and top-down control might be the solution in the past, but the present needs federal systems, as the complexity is seamlessly rising with the rise of economic, social and cultural evolution. We are standing at crossroads now. Artificial Intelligence, behavioural economics, Big Data and cybernetics are shaping our society, be it good or bad. Compatibility of society’s values and ever-spreading technologies is the need of the hour. Lack of which could lead to an automated society with features like that of a dictator. We need to take certain steps to decentralize the function of information systems, maintain the integrity of the information, support economic, social and cultural diversity, increase transparency and support collective intelligence. Because Dirk Helbing rightly said, “He who has large amounts of data can manipulate people in subtle ways. But even benevolent decision-makers may do more wrong than right”

References:
https://www.express.co.uk/news/science/922802/robots-will-murder-humans-without-brain-control-implant
https://medium.com/@askwhy/artificial-intelligence-and-immortal-dictatorship-fantasy-or-reality-3ae3d8a359c7
https://www.businessinsider.in/Elon-Musk-warns-that-creation-of-god-like-AI-could-doom-mankind-to-an-eternity-of-robot-dictatorship/articleshow/63647102.cms
https://www.express.co.uk/news/science/942367/ai-elon-musk-robot-dictator-warning
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/will-democracy-survive-big-data-and-artificial-intelligence/

-Shreya Jain