We need to talk about Artificial Intelligence
- Dialogue is hampered by an information gap between creators of AI technology and policymakers trying to regulate it.
- Knowledge building is critical to set a framework of ethics and norms in which AI can innovate safely.
- Principles are valuable only if they are agreed upon and if they are actually implemented.
While consensus starts to form around the impact that AI will have on humankind, civil society, the public and the private sector alike are increasing their requests for accountability and trust-building. Ethical considerations such as AI bias (by race, gender, or other criteria), and algorithmic transparency (clarity on the rules and methods by which machines make decisions) have already negatively impacted society through the technologies we use daily.
Technology providers – lack of clarity on AI ethics
Compared with other corporate social responsibilities, AI is accelerating the need for technology companies to advance conversations about ethics and trust, as AI echoes societal behaviour. With AI, corporations risk being the driver of an exponential increase of the biases already existing in society at an irreversible scale and rate.
Therefore, technology companies need both ethics literacy and a commitment to multidisciplinary research to create a sound understanding and adoption of ethics. However, through their training and during their careers, the technical teams behind AI developments are not methodically educated about the complexity of human social systems, how their products could negatively impact society, and how to embed ethics in their designs.
See the full story here: https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2021/02/we-need-to-talk-about-artificial-intelligence/
