In a speech at the headquarters of the United Nations (UN), the president of the United States (USA) Donald Trump criticized global initiatives for the regulation and governance of Artificial Intelligence (AI).
"The United States also totally rejects any attempt to create a globalist scheme to control artificial intelligence," he said, during his speech at the opening of the 81st UN General Assembly, this Wednesday (22).
China and the USA lead different initiatives that seek to influence the production chain around AI. On the one hand, Washington's initiative envisions a system with "trusted partners" to control the development of AI.
On the other hand, the proposal led by Beijing calls on all nations to participate in AI governance through open source systems, which allows the technology to be appropriated by any company or organization.
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AI governance specialist Ettore Arpini, founder of the Plures organization that supports professionals working in AI, highlighted to Agência Brasil that Trump's position opposes several initiatives, including at the UN, with the aim of leaving companies without any regulation.
"This is completely contrary to the movement of other countries to form an alliance of middle powers to collaborate, to bring back multilateralism and create a model of governance and international regulations for AI", he commented.
Limits to AI
US President Donald Trump also rejected that the country will limit the advancement of the development of AI and argued that whoever controls the technology will be the "winner" of the new technological revolution.
"At the moment, we are far ahead of China and everyone else. And we will maintain that advantage. We will maintain a firm and decisive stance. I will not stifle the growth of something that will be greater than the Industrial Revolution," he said.
Last week, AI industry leaders in the US defended a slowdown in the pace of development of the most advanced models, which would be evolving faster than control and security mechanisms.
At the same time, economists have pointed out a possible "bubble" in the sector due to the high level of investment and doubts about the ability to return these resources, which could generate financial crises with repercussions on the global economy.
"Intense competition increases the risk of companies allocating excess resources to investment projects with still uncertain returns, making all companies vulnerable to disappointments in AI results", says a report from the Bank for International Settlements (BIS).
Superintelligence
Still in the UN speech, Trump also promised to change the name of the technology to "superintelligence".
"From now on, it will officially be called superintelligence. We changed the name because using the word 'artificial' makes the intelligence seem fake," he said.
Expert Ettore Arpini, from Plures, highlighted that it is problematic to call AI a superintelligence, which may confuse rather than help, and favor the US position in the race for global control of AI.
"It also has a political dimension, because in Washington there is a narrative that the United States leads AI. Calling AI superintelligence also helps to build this narrative that favors the USA", he commented.
For Arpini, the important thing is not to define whether or not it is intelligence. "This can even distract us. What matters is what capabilities these systems have, how autonomous they are, who governs them and what consequences they have on society - and which countries are preparing themselves", he concluded
